3 Sufis 3

1) It’s about time someone in the “paper of record” finally got some wisdom about Iraq. Things really do seem to be turning in the US, and this is a very good sign indeed:
——————————————————

July 1, 2005

America Held Hostage
By PAUL KRUGMAN
New York Times Op-Ed

A majority of Americans now realize that President Bush deliberately misled the nation to promote a war in Iraq. But Mr. Bush’s speech on Tuesday contained a chilling message: America has been taken hostage by his martial dreams. According to Mr. Bush, the nation now has no choice except to keep fighting the war he wanted to fight.

Never mind that Iraq posed no threat before we invaded. Now it’s a “central front in the war on terror,” Mr. Bush says, quoting Osama bin Laden as an authority. And since a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq would, Mr. Bush claims, be a victory for Al Qaeda, Americans have to support this war – and that means supporting him. After all, you wage war with the president you have, not the president you want.

But America doesn’t have to let itself be taken hostage. The country missed the chance to say no before this war started, but it can still say no to Mr. Bush’s open-ended commitment, and demand a timetable for getting out.

I know that this argument will be hard to sell. Despite everything that has happened, many Americans still want to believe that this war can and should be seen through to victory. But it’s time to face up to three realities. First, the war is helping, not hurting, the terrorists. Second, the kind of clear victory the hawks promised is no longer possible, if it ever was. Third, a time limit on our commitment will do more good than harm.

Before the war, opponents warned that it would strengthen, not weaken, terrorism. And so it has: a recent C.I.A. report warns that since the U.S. invasion, Iraq has become what Afghanistan was under the Soviet occupation, only more so: a magnet and training ground for Islamic extremists, who will eventually threaten other countries.

And the situation in Iraq isn’t improving. “The White House is completely disconnected from reality,” said Senator Chuck Hagel, referring to upbeat assessments of progress. “It’s like they’re just making it up as they go along. The reality is that we’re losing in Iraq.”

Mr. Hagel claims to believe that we can still win, but it’s hard to see how.

More troops might help, but pretty much the whole U.S. Army is already in Iraq, on its way back from Iraq or getting ready to go to Iraq. And the coalition of the willing is shrinking.

Helping Iraqis rebuild their country could help win hearts and minds. But for all the talk of newly painted schools, the fact is that reconstruction, originally stalled by incompetence and corruption, is now stalled by the lack of security. When Ibrahim al-Jafaari, the Iraqi prime minister, visited Washington, he was accompanied by Iraqi journalists. One of them asked Mr. Bush, “When will you begin the reconstruction in Iraq?”

Meanwhile, time is running out for America’s volunteer military, which is cracking under the strain of a war it was never designed to fight.

So what would happen if the United States gave up its open-ended commitment to Iraq and set a timetable for withdrawal?

Mr. Bush claims that such a step would “send the wrong signal to our troops, who need to know that we are serious about completing the mission.” But what the troops need to know is that their country won’t demand more than they can give. He also claims that it would encourage the insurgents, who will “know that all they have to do is to wait us out.” But the insurgents don’t seem to need encouragement.

It’s far more likely that if the Iraqi government knew that our support had an expiration date, it would both look to its own defenses and, more important, try harder to find a political solution to the insurgency.

The Iraq that emerges once U.S. forces are gone won’t bear much resemblance to the free-market, pro-American, Israel-friendly democracy the neocons promised. But it will pose less of a terrorist threat than the Iraq we have now.

Remember, Iraq wasn’t a breeding ground for terrorists before we went there. All indications are that the foreign terrorists now infesting Iraq are there on the sufferance of a homegrown insurgency that finds them useful for the moment but that, brutal as it is, isn’t interested in an apocalyptic confrontation with the Western world. Once we’re no longer targets, the foreign terrorists won’t be welcome.

The point is that the presence of American forces in Iraq is making our country less safe. So it’s time to start winding down the war.

E-mail: krugman@nytimes.com

2) An additional point to this story — the “Yeni Safak” newspaper referred to in the beginning is a somewhat unreliable Islamist newspaper in Turkey. I’ll always remember them for stating that the 1999 earthquake was God’s punishment for Turkey’s drinkers, secular state, and alliance with Israel. This, of course, does not at all take away from the credibility of Dahr Jamal, the Iraqi journalist who posted this article on his blog…:

June 23, 2005
by Dahr Jamal
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/archives/dispatches/000256.php

At long last, the culminating session of the World
Tribunal on Iraq is upon us. As a witness providing testimony, like the other witnesses I’m being
interviewed by many outlets. Today, one of them was by
reporters for one of the larger newspapers in Turkey, the Yeni Safak Newspaper.

I’ll leave the reporters nameless, for reasons you’ll
soon see.

The newspaper has been translating various articles of
mine into Turkish and running them, particularly those concerning the most recent Fallujah massacre. The report who was interviewing me today told me that the former American consulate here, Eric Edelman, asked the Prime Minister of Turkey to pressure his paper to not run so many of my stories.

“Why did he do this,” I asked him.

“Edelman said it was the wrong news,” he told me with
a smile. Turns out Edelman also asked that articles by Robert Fisk and Naomi Klein not be run so often in Yeni Safak either.

He smiled at me while he watched the wheels turning in
my head before I smiled back and said, “That makes me very happy, it means I’m doing my job as a journalist.”

We laughed heartily together at this, as did everyone
else at the table.

Reminds me of the obtuse hate mails I sometimes
receive-confirmation that I am doing my job-they always make me smile.

So the American government is pressuring foreign
countries to censor their news. Aside from the fact that this act is the height of arrogance by the
United States, it makes it exceedingly clear why so
many Americans who rely on the corporate media for their news continue to be so misinformed/un-informed about the goings on in Iraq. If the American
government is attempting to censor the news in foreign
countries, you can imagine what they are doing at home.

Because people like Edelman don’t want citizens of the
United States to know that events like the massacre of Fallujah or the atrocities in Abu Ghraib are not isolated incidents.

People like Edelman don’t want people to know what one
of my sources in Baquba just told me today.

His email reads:

“Near the city of Buhrez, 5 kilometers south of
Baquba, two Humvess of American soldiers were destroyed recently. American and Iraqi soldiers came
to the city afterwards and cut all the phones, cut the
water, cut medicine from arriving in the city and told them that until the people of the city
bring the “terrorists” to them, the embargo will

continue.”

The embargo has been in place now for one week now,
and he continued:

“The Americans still won’t anyone or any medicines and
supplies into Buhrez, nor will they allow any people in or out. Even the Al-Sadr followers who organized some help for the people in the city (water, food,
medicine) are not being allowed into the city. Even
journalists cannot enter to publish the news, and the situation there is so bad. The Americans keep asking for the people in the city to bring them the persons who were in charge of destroying the two Humvees on the other side of the city, but of course the people in the city don’t know who carried out the attack.”

People like Edelman don’t want people to know about
the recent US attacks in Al-Qa’im and Haditha either. Attacks that Iraqis are describing as just as bad as the massacre of Fallujah.

On Haditha and Al-Qa’im, an Iraqi doctor sent me this
email yesterday:

“Listen…we witnessed crimes in the west area of the
country of what the bastards did in Haditha and Al-Qa’im. It was a crime, a really big crime we have witnessed and filmed in those places and recently also in Fallujah. We need big help in the western area of the country. Our doctors need urgent help there. Please, this is an URGENT humanitarian request from the hospitals in the west of the country. We have big proof on how the American troops destroyed one of our hospitals, how they burned the whole store of medication of the west area of Iraq and how they
killed a patient in the ward…how they prevented us from helping the people in al-Qa’im. This is an URGENT Humanitarian request. The hospitals in the
west of Iraq ask for urgent help…we are in a big humanitarian medical disaster…”

People like Edelman don’t want the public to know that
the same tactics used in Fallujah by the US military-posting snipers around the city to shoot anyone who moves, targeting ambulances, impeding medical care, or the detaining of innocent civilians en masse.

After all, Fallujah is the model. Fallujah is our
Guernica. And now, Haditha, Al-Qa’im can be added to the list, with Baquba and Buhrez under deconstruction.

3) I can only imagine someone trying to figure out US airstrikes or rendition abductions by deciphering Fox News telecasts. It’s surreal, and of course always good to know our security is still in good hands. CIA on the beat:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1516940,00.html

CIA blunder on al-Jazeera ‘terror messages’

Gary Younge in New York and Vikram Dodd
Wednesday June 29, 2005
The Guardian

CIA analysts forced 30 flights to be cancelled and raised the US terror alert from yellow to orange because they thought that al-Qaida was sending hidden messages through the headlines of the Arabic television news channel al-Jazeera, it has been revealed.

According to a report by NBC, CIA experts thought they had decoded messages that they believed gave dates, flight numbers and geographic coordinates for targets that included the White House, Seattle’s Space Needle and even the small town of Tappahannock, Virginia, which has a population of 2,000…

4) Privacy petition:

http://action.stopfamilyviolence.org/content.jsp?key=566

Take the Oath to Protect Confidentiality

The US military has declared war on the privacy rights of rape victims and their therapists. If they win, it could give the military the power to invade the private, confidential conversations we all have with our physicians, lawyers, therapists, or even spouses.

Your help is urgently needed to fight back.
Sign a citizen or professional oath indicating your interest in making sure that privacy rights are upheld. Bier’s attorney, Wendy Murphy, will take your pledges with her to federal court to help bolster her arguments to keep confidential communications from military purview….

5) This is a long and fascinating article about 9/11 (sorry about the graphics, but it’s too long to edit):

Former Bush Admin Economist Says Official Story of
> WTC Collapse ‘Bogus’
> United Press International
>
http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20050613-102755-6408r.htm

> A former Bush team member during his first
> administration is now voicing
> serious
> doubts about the collapse of the World Trade Center
> on 9-11.
>
> Former chief economist for the Department of Labor
> during President George
> W.
> Bush’s first term Morgan Reynolds comments that the
> official story about
> the
> collapse of the WTC is “bogus” and that it is more
> likely that a controlled
> demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent
> Building No. 7.
>
> Reynolds, who also served as director of the
> Criminal Justice Center at the
> National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas and is
> now professor emeritus
> at
> Texas A&M; University said, “If demolition destroyed
> three steel skyscrapers
> at
> the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an
> ‘inside job’ and a
> government attack on America would be compelling.”
>
> Reynolds commented from his Texas A&M; office, “It is
> hard to exaggerate the
> importance of a scientific debate over the cause of
> the collapse of the
> twin
> towers and building 7. If the official wisdom on the
> collapses is wrong, as
> I
> believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous
> engineering analysis is
> not
> likely to be correct either. The government’s
> collapse theory is highly
> vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional
> demolition appears to
> account for
> the full range of facts associated with the collapse
> of the three
> buildings.”
>
>
> Why Did the Trade Center Skyscrapers Collapse?
>
http://prisonplanet.com/articles/june2005/150605wtccollapse.htm
> Morgan Reynolds
>
> “It didn’t seem real… There are thousands of
> these steel beams that
> just
> fell like pickup sticks.”
>
> ~ John Albanese, volunteer firefighter and amateur
> photographer
>
> “What struck us – guys like Warren Jennings and
> myself, who have
> spent
> basically all our lives in the scrap business – we’d
> never seen steel
> this
> heavy, this huge, this massive. It was just
> unbelievable.”
>
> ~ Michael Henderson (p. 93),
> General Manager, Marine Terminals, Metal Management
> NE
>
> To explain the unanticipated free-fall collapses of
> the twin towers at the
> World
> Trade Center on September 11, 2001, mainstream
> experts (also see The
> American
> Professional Constructor, October 2004, pp. 12–18)
> offer a three-stage
> argument:
> 1) an airplane impact weakened each structure, 2) an
> intense fire thermally
> weakened structural components that may have
> suffered damage to
> fireproofing
> materials, causing buckling failures, which, in
> turn, 3) allowed the upper
> floors to pancake onto the floors below.
>
> Many will nod their head, OK, that does it and go
> back to watching the NBA
> finals or whatever, but I find this theory just
> about as satisfying as the
> fantastic conspiracy theory that “19 young Arabs
> acting at the behest of
> Islamist extremists headquartered in distant
> Afghanistan” caused 9/11. The
> government’s collapse theory is highly vulnerable on
> its own terms, but
> its
> blinkered narrowness and lack of breadth is the
> paramount defect unshared
> by its
> principal scientific rival – controlle
d demolition.
> Only professional
> demolition
> appears to account for the full range of facts
> associated with the
> collapses of
> WTC 1 (North Tower), WTC 2 (South Tower), and the
> much-overlooked collapse
> of
> the 47-story WTC building 7 at 5:21 pm on that
> fateful day.
>
> The scientific controversy over the initial
> structural weakening has two
> parts:
> what caused the original tower damage and did that
> damage “severely” weaken
> the
> structures? Photos show a stable, motionless North
> Tower (WTC 1) after the
> damage suffered at 8:46 am and the South Tower after
> its 9:03 am impact. If
> we
> focus on the North Tower, close examination of
> photos reveals arguably
> “minor”
> rather than “severe” damage in the North Tower and
> its perimeter columns.
>
> As many as 45 exterior columns between floors 94 and
> 98 on the northeast
> (impact) side of the North Tower were fractured –
> separated from each
> other –
> yet there is no direct evidence of “severe”
> structural weakening. None of
> the up
> per sections of the broken perimeter columns visibly
> sags or buckles toward
> its
> counterpart column below. We can infer this because
> of the aluminum covers
> on
> the columns: each seam uniformly aligns properly
> across the Tower, forming
> a
> horizontal “dashed line” in the façade from beveled
> end to end. Despite
> an
> impact hole, gaps in perimeter columns, and missing
> parts of floors 95–98
> at the
> opening, the aluminum façade shows no evidence of
> vertical displacement
> in the
> columns, suggestive of little or no wider floor
> buckling at the perimeter.
>
> The aluminum covers attached to the columns also
> aligned vertically after
> impact, that is, separated columns continued to
> visually remain “plumb”
> (true
> vertical), lining up top to bottom around the
> aperture, implying no
> perceptible
> horizontal displacement of the columns. Photographic
> evidence for the
> northeast
> side of the North Tower showed no wider secondary
> structural impact beyond
> the
> opening itself. Of course, there was smoke pouring
> out of the upper floors.
>
> The fact that perimeter columns were not displaced
> suggests that the floors
> did
> not buckle or sag. Despite missing parts of floors
> 95–98, photos show no
> buckling or sag on other floors. If so, that boosts
> the likelihood that
> there
> was little damage to the core. Photos do not
> document what happened within
> the
> interior/core and no one was allowed to inspect and
> preserve relevant
> rubble
> before government authorities – primarily FEMA – had
> it quickly
> removed.
> Eyewitness testimony by those who escaped from
> inside the North Tower
> concerning
> core damage probably is unavailable.
>
> Photos do not allow us to peer far into the interior
> of the building; in
> fact
> the hole is black, with no flames visible. We know
> that the structural core
> and
> its steel was incredibly strong (claimed 600%
> redundancy) making it
> unlikely
> that the core was “severely” damaged at impact.
> There were 47 core columns
> connected to each other by steel beams within an
> overall rectangular core
> floor
> area of approximately 87 feet x 137 feet (26.5 m x
> 41.8 m). Each column had
> a
> rectangular cross section of approximately 36″ x 14″
> at the base (90 cm x
> 36 cm)
> with steel 4″ thick all around (100 mm), tapering to
> ¼” (6 mm) thickness
> at the
> top. Each floor was also extremely strong (p. 26), a
> grid of steel,
> contrary to
> claims of a lightweight “truss” system.
>
> Those who support the official account like Thomas
> Eagar (p. 14), professor
> of
> materials engineering and engineering systems at
> MIT, usually argue that
> the
> collapse must be explained by the heat from the
> fires because the loss of
> loading-bearing capacity from the holes in the
> Towers was too small. The
> transfer of load would have been within the capacity
> of the towers. Since
> steel
> used in buildings must be able to bear five times
> its normal load, Eagar
> points
> out, the steel in the towers could have collapsed
> only if heated to the
> point
> where it “lost 80 percent of its strength, ” around
> 1,300oF. Eagar believes
> that
> this is what happened, though the fires did not
> appear to be extensive and
> intense enough, quickly billowing black smoke and
> relatively few flames.
>
> While some experts claim that airliner impact
> severely weakened the entire
> structural system, evidence is lacking. The
> perimeters of floors 94–98
> did not
> appear severely weakened, much less the entire
> structural system. The
> criminal
> code requires that crime scene evidence be saved for
> forensic analysis but
> FEMA
> had it destroyed before anyone could seriously
> investigate it. FEMA was in
> position to take command because it had arrived the
> day before the attacks
> at
> New York’s Pier 29 to conduct a war game exercise,
> “Tripod II,” quite a
> coincidence. The authorities apparently considered
> the rubble quite
> valuable:
> New York City officials had every debris truck
> tracked on GPS and had one
> truck
> driver who took an unauthorized 1 ½ hour lunch
> fired.
>
> The preliminary NIST Response claims that “the wall
> section above the
> impact
> zone moved downward” (pdf, p. 36) on WTC 1 but
> offers no evidence. It
> offers
> photographic evidence, however, for a “hanging floor
> slab” on the 82d floor
> of
> the South Tower at 9:55 a.m. This looks minor though
> because there is no
> sag on
> adjacent floors and the integrity of the structure
> looks very much intact.
> The
> fire looks weak too, yet the South Tower collapsed
> only four minutes later.
> This
> would be quite a puzzle without a demolition theory.
>
> About a dozen of the fragmented ends of exterior
> columns in the North Tower
> hole
> were bent but the bends faced the “wrong way”
> because they pointed toward
> the
> outside of the Tower. This fact is troublesome for
> the official theory that
> a
> plane crash created the hole and subsequent
> explosion between floors 94 and
> 98.
> The laws of physics imply that a high-speed airplane
> with fuel-filled wings
> breaking through thin perimeter columns would
> deflect the shattered ends of
> the
> columns inward, if deflected in any direction,
> certainly not bend them
> outward
> toward the exterior.
>
> A possible response would be that, well, yes, an
> airliner crash would bend
> a
> column inward rather than outward, if bent at all,
> but the subsequent force
> of a
> jet fuel blast would act in the opposite direction:
> any inward bends caused
> by
> plane impact would straighten toward vertical or
> even reverse the bent
> steel
> columns toward the exterior under blast pressure.
> However, such a proposed
> steel
> “reversal theory” (first bend inward by collision,
> then bend outward by
> explosion) suffers two major handicaps:
>
> 1.
> No “inward-bending columns” were obs
erved and
> it would be unlikely
> that
> each and every one would be reversed by subsequent
> explosion, and
>
> 2.
> the hypothesis is ad hoc and lacks simplicity,
> both scientific
> negatives.
>
> Occam’s razor would suggest that the outward bends
> in the perimeter
> columns were
> caused by explosions from inside the tower rather
> than bends caused by
> airliner
> impact from outside. Also supporting this theory is
> the fact that the
> uniformly
> neat ends of the blown perimeter columns are
> consistent with the linear
> shaped
> charges demolition experts use to slice steel as
> thick as 10 inches. The
> hypothesis of linear shaped charges also explains
> the perfectly formed
> crosses
> found in the rubble (crucifix-shaped fragments of
> core column structures),
> as
> well as the rather-neatly shorn steel everywhere.
>
> The engineering establishment’s theory has further
> difficulties. It is
> well-known that the hole in the west wing of the
> Pentagon, less than
> 18-foot
> diameter, was too small to accommodate a Boeing 757,
> but the North
> Tower’s hole
> wasn’t big enough for a Boeing 767 either, the
> alleged widebody airliner
> used on
> AA Flight 11 (officially tail number N334AA,
> FAA-listed as “destroyed”). A
> Boeing 767 has a wingspan of 155’ 1″ (47.6 m) yet
> the maximum distance
> across
> the hole in the North Tower was about 115 feet (35
> m), a hole undersized by
> some
> 40 feet or 26 percent. “The last few feet at the
> tips of the wings did not
> even
> break through the exterior columns,” comments
> Hufschmid (p. 27). But 20
> feet on
> each wing? I’d call that a substantial difference,
> not “the last few
> feet,”
> especially since aircraft impact holes tend to be
> three times the size of
> the
> aircraft, reflecting the fact that fuel-laden
> airliners flying into
> buildings
> send things smashing about in a big way. The small
> size of the holes in
> both
> towers casts doubt on the airliner-impact hypothesis
> and favors
> professional
> demolition again. There were no reports of plane
> parts, especially wings,
> shorn
> off in the collision and bounced to the ground on
> the northeast side of the
> tower, to my knowledge, though FEMA reported a few
> small pieces to the
> south at
> Church street (pp. 68–9) and atop WTC-5 to the east
> of WTC-1.
>
> Adding to the suspicious nature of the small
> aperture in WTC 1 is that some
> vertical gaps in the columns on the left side of the
> northeast hole were so
> short, probably less than three feet (p. 105) high
> (p. 27). Not much of a
> jumbo
> jet could pass through such an opening, especially
> since a fuel-laden plane
> would not minimize its frontal area. The engines are
> a special problem
> because
> each engine is enormous and dense, consisting mainly
> of tempered steel and
> weighing 24 to 28.5 tons, depending upon model. No
> engine was recovered in
> the
> rubble yet no hydrocarbon fire could possibly
> vaporize it.
>
> The hole in the North Tower also is suspicious
> because it did not even have
> a
> continuous opening at the perimeter, but instead
> contained substantial WTC
> material (p. 27) just left of center (pp. 62, 105).
> This material appears
> integral to that area, so it did not move much,
> suggesting minimal
> displacement
> and no clean penetration by a jumbo jet. These huge
> airliners weigh 82 tons
> empty and have a maximum takeoff weight of up to 193
> tons.
>
> In the case of the South Tower, an engine from UAL
> Flight 175 (tail number
> N612UA and FAA-registered as still valid!) has not
> been recovered despite
> the
> fact that the flight trajectory of the video plane
> implied that the right
> engine
> would miss the South Tower. Photos showing minor
> engine parts on the ground
> are
> unconvincing, to put it mildly. Perhaps independent
> jet engine experts
> (retired?) can testify to the contrary. Further
> contradicting the official
> account, the beveled edge of the southeast side of
> the south tower was
> completely intact upon initial impact. The
> government never produced a jet
> engine yet claimed it recovered the passport of
> alleged hijacker Satam al
> Suqami
> unharmed by a fiery crash and catastrophic collapse
> of the North Tower. The
> government has not produced voice (CVR) or flight
> data recorders (FDR) in
> the
> New York attack either, so-called black boxes, a
> fact unprecedented in the
> aviation history of major domestic crashes.
>
> Adding to the problems of the official theory is the
> fact that photos of
> the
> North Tower hole show no evidence of a plane either.
> There is no
> recognizable
> wreckage or plane parts at the immediate crash site.
> While the issue
> probably
> takes us too far afield, the landing wheel assembly
> that allegedly flew out
> of
> the North Tower and was found several streets away
> could easily have been
> planted by FEMA or other government agents. I’ve
> never seen any objective
> analysis of this wheel assembly though it would be
> welcome. In fact, the
> government has failed to produce significant
> wreckage from any of the four
> alleged airliners that fateful day. The familiar
> photo of the Flight 93
> crash
> site in Pennsylvania (The 9/11 Commission Report,
> Ch. 9) shows no fuselage,
> engine or anything recognizable as a plane, just a
> smoking hole in the
> ground.
> Photographers reportedly were not allowed near the
> hole. Neither the FBI
> nor the
> National Transportation Safety Board have
> investigated or produced any
> report on
> the alleged airliner crashes.
>
> The WTC 1 and Pentagon holes were not alone in being
> too small. Photos show
> that
> the hole in WTC 2 also was too small to have been
> caused by the crash of a
> Boeing 767. In fact, the South Tower hole is
> substantially smaller than the
> North Tower hole.
>
> The next question is whether the fires were hot
> enough to cause the WTC
> buildings to collapse. In defending the official
> account and its clones
> that try
> to explain the unprecedented collapses of three
> steel-framed skyscrapers
> without
> demolition, heat arguably is more important than
> structural impact.
> That’s
> obviously true for building WTC 7 because there was
> no alleged airplane
> impact.
>
> First, no steel-framed skyscraper, even engulfed in
> flames hour after hour,
> had
> ever collapsed before. Suddenly, three stunning
> collapses occur within a
> few
> city blocks on the same day, two allegedly hit by
> aircraft, the third not.
> These
> extraordinary collapses after short-duration minor
> fires made it all the
> more
> important to preserve the evidence, mostly steel
> girders, to study what had
> happened. On fire intensity, consider this
> benchmark: A 1991 FEMA report on
> Philadelphia’s Meridian Plaza fire said that the
> fire was so energetic
> that
> “[b]eams and girders sagged and twisted,” but
> “[d]espite this extraordinary
> exposure, the columns continued to support their
> loads without obvio
us
> damage”
> (quoted by Griffin, p. 15). Such an intense fire
> with consequent sagging
> and
> twisting steel beams bears no resemblance to what we
> observed at the WTC.
>
> Second, severe structural damage to the WTC towers
> would have required
> fires
> that were not only large but growing throughout the
> buildings and burning
> for a
> considerable period of time. None of these
> conditions was present. “The
> lack of
> flames is an indication that the fires were small,
> and the dark smoke is an
> indication that the fires were suffocating,” points
> out Hufschmid (p. 35).
> Eyewitnesses in the towers, as well as police and
> firefighters, reported
> (pp.
> 199–200) the same thing.
>
> Third, the impact opening was 15 floors lower in the
> South Tower than in
> the
> North Tower, where core columns were thicker, so the
> South Tower fire had
> to
> produce more heat to raise the steel temperatures to
> soften up (thermally
> weaken) the steel columns. Yet its fires were
> considerably smaller and 30
> minutes shorter in duration. The Tower collapsed
> after burning only 56
> minutes.
> A prime candidate to explain why “the wrong tower
> fell first” is that the
> small
> dying fire in the South Tower forced the hand of the
> mass murderers who
> decided
> to trigger demolition earlier than planned in order
> to sustain the lie that
> fire
> caused the collapse. The North Tower stood for
> another 29 minutes and its
> core
> steel was thinner at its upper stories. The 1991
> Meridian Plaza fire burned
> for
> 19 hours and the fire was so extreme that flames
> came from dozens of
> windows on
> many floors. It did not collapse.
>
> Fourth, implicitly trying to explain away these
> difficulties, the current
> NIST
> investigation, conducted by “an extended
> investigation team of 236 people,”
> makes “dislodged fireproofing” the key variable to
> explain the collapses.
> Supposedly, “the probable collapse sequence for the
> WTC towers are (sic)
> based
> on the behavior of thermally weakened structural
> components that had
> extensive
> damage to fireproofing or gypsum board fire
> protection induced by the
> debris
> field generated by aircraft impact” (p. 111). “Had
> fireproofing not been
> dislodged by debris field,” this team of
> government-paid experts claims,
> “temperature rise of structural components would
> likely have been
> insufficient
> to induce global collapse” (p. 108). Perhaps
> acknowledging the lack of
> direct
> evidence for its conjectures, the NIST admits that
> “a full collapse of the
> WTC
> floor system would not occur even with a number of
> failed trusses or
> connections” and it “recognizes inherent
> uncertainties” (pp. 110 and 112).
> The
> NIST will have to boost its creativity to plausibly
> explain the WTC 7
> collapse
> because it won’t have the benefit of tales of
> aircraft and debris fields.
>
> Aside from specific defects in the fire collapse
> theory, a wide variety of
> facts
> undermine it:
>
> * Photos show people walking around in the hole
> in the North Tower
> “where
> 10,000 gallons of jet fuel were supposedly burning.
> The women (p. 27) seem
> to
> (sic) looking down to the ground” (the NIST
> “Response” pdf, p. 62, also
> shows a
> similar photo of the same blond woman with
> light-colored slacks looking
> over the
> edge of the 94th floor).
> * By the time the South Tower was hit, most of
> the North Tower’s
> flames had
> already vanished, burning for only 16 minutes.
> * The fire did not grow over time, probably
> because it quickly ran out
> of
> fuel and was suffocating rather than the sprinkler
> system dousing the
> fires.
> * FDNY fire fighters remain under a gag order
> (Rodriguezvs-1.Bush.pdf,
> p.
> 10) to not discuss the explosions they heard, felt
> and saw. FAA personnel
> are
> also under a 9/11 gag order.
> * Even the 9/11 Commission (Kean-Zelikow) Report
> acknowledges that
> “none of
> the [fire] chiefs present believed that a total
> collapse of either tower
> was
> possible” (Ch. 9, p. 302). It shocked everyone that
> day, amateur and
> professional alike, although some firefighters
> realized that so-called
> secondary
> explosive devices were a risk.
>
> Griffin (pp. 25–7) succinctly identifies the primary
> defects in the
> official
> account of the WTC collapses, and its sister
> theories. These problems were
> entirely ignored by The 9/11 Commission Report
> (2004), so the government
> appointees must have found it difficult to account
> for the following facts:
>
> 1. Fire had never before caused steel-frame
> buildings to collapse except
> for
> the three buildings on 9/11, nor has fire collapsed
> any steel high rise
> since
> 9/11.
> 2. The fires, especially in the South Tower and
> WTC-7, were small.
> 3. WTC-7 was unharmed by an airplane and had only
> minor fires on the
> seventh
> and twelfth floors of this 47-story steel building
> yet it collapsed in less
> than
> 10 seconds.
> 4. WTC-5 and WTC-6 had raging fires but did not
> collapse despite much
> thinner
> steel beams (pp. 68–9).
> 5. In a PBS documentary, Larry Silverstein, the
> WTC lease-holder,
> recalled
> talking to the fire department commander on 9/11
> about WTC-7 and said,
> “…maybe
> the smartest thing to do is pull it,” slang for
> demolish it.
> 6. FEMA, given the uninviting task of explaining
> the collapse of
> Building 7
> with mention of demolition verboten admitted that
> the best it could come up
> with
> had “only a low probability of occurrence.”
> 7. It’s difficult if not impossible for
> hydrocarbon fires like those
> fed by
> jet fuel (kerosene) to raise the temperature of
> steel close to melting.
>
> Professional demolition, by contrast, can explain
> all of these facts and
> more.
> Demolition means placing explosives throughout a
> building, and detonating
> them
> in sequence to weaken “the structure so it collapses
> or folds in upon
> itself”
> (p. 44). In conventional demolitions gravity does
> most of the work,
> although it
> probably did a minority on 9/11, so heavily were the
> towers honeycombed
> with
> explosives.
>
> 1. Each WTC building collapse occurred at
> virtually free-fall speed
> (approximately 10 seconds or less).
> 2. Each building collapsed, for the most part,
> into its own footprint.
> 3. Virtually all the concrete (an estimated
> 100,000 tons in each tower)
> on
> every floor was pulverized into a very fine dust, a
> phenomenon that
> requires
> enormous energy and could not be caused by gravity
> alone (“…workers
> can’t even
> find concrete. ‘It’s all dust,’ [the official]
> said”).
> 4. Dust exploded horizontally for a couple
> hundred feet, as did debris,
> at
> the beginning of each tower’s collapse.
> 5. Collapses were total, leaving none of the
> massive core columns
> sticking up
> hundreds of feet into the air.
> 6. Salvage experts were amazed at how small the
> debris stacks were.
> 7. The steel beams and columns came down in
> sections under 30 feet long
> and
> had no signs of “softening”; there was little left
> but shorn sections of
> steel
> and a few bits of concrete.
> 8. Photos and videos of the collapses all show
> “demolition waves,”
> meaning
> “confluent rows of small explosions” along floors
> (blast sequences).
> 9. According to many witnesses, explosions
> occurred within the
> buildings.
> 10. Each collapse had detectable seismic
> vibrations suggestive of
> underground
> explosions, similar to the 2.3 earthquake magnitude
> from a demolition like
> the
> Seattle Kingdome (p. 108).
> 11. Each collapse produced molten steel identical
> to that generated by
> explosives, resulting in “hot spots” that persisted
> for months (the two
> hottest
> spots at WTC-2 and WTC-7 were approximately 1,350o F
> five days after being
> continuously flooded with water, a temperature high
> enough to melt aluminum
> (p.
> 70).
>
> Controlled demolition would have required unimpeded
> access to the WTC,
> access to
> explosives, avoiding detection, and the expertise to
> orchestrate the deadly
> destruction from a nearby secure location. Such
> access before 9/11 likely
> depended on complicity by one or more WTC security
> companies. These
> companies
> focus on “access control” and as security specialist
> Wayne Black says,
> “When you
> have a security contract, you know the inner
> workings of everything.”
> Stratesec,
> a now-defunct company that had security contracts at
> the World Trade Center
> and
> Dulles International Airport, should be
> investigated, among others, because
> of
> the strange coincidence that President Bush’s
> brother, Marvin P. Bush,
> and his
> cousin, Wirt D. Walker III, were principals in the
> company, with Walker
> acting
> as CEO from 1999 until January 2002 and Marvin
> reportedly in New York on
> 9/11.
> At least one report claims that a “power down”
> condition prevailed on
> September
> 8–9 (pdf, p. 45) at WTC to complete a “cabling
> upgrade,” presenting an
> opportunity to plant explosives with low risk of
> detection.
>
> A related point is that demolition companies go to
> considerable expense to
> wire
> steel-framed skyscrapers with explosives to produce
> safe implosions, and
> they
> would love to do it more cheaply by simply setting
> two small fires like
> those
> that (allegedly) caved in building 7. Apparently,
> the terrorist-inventors
> have
> kept this new technology secret.
>
> Why would the killers destroy WTC-7, especially
> since a collapse would
> arouse
> suspicion in some quarters? A logical if unproven
> theory is that the
> perpetrators used Mayor Giuliani’s sealed OEM
> “bunker” on the 23d story
> of WTC-7
> to conduct the twin tower implosions and then
> destroyed the building and
> evidence to cover up their crimes, just as a
> murderer might set his
> victim’s
> dwelling ablaze to cover up the crime (one in four
> fires is arson).
> Giuliani’s
> “undisclosed secret location” was perfect because it
> had been evacuated by
> 9:45
> a.m. on 9/11, it enabled unmolested work, provided a
> ringside seat, was
> bullet-
> and bomb-resistant, had its own secure air and water
> supply, and could
> withstand
> winds of 160 mph, necessary protection from the wind
> blasts generated by
> collapsing skyscrapers.
>
> There is special import in the fact of free-fall
> collapse (item one in the
> list
> immediately above), if only because everyone agrees
> that the towers fell at
> free-fall speed. This makes pancake collapse with
> one floor progressively
> falling onto the floor below an unattractive
> explanation. Progressive
> pancaking
> cannot happen at free-fall speed (“g” or 9.8 m/s2).
> Free-fall would require
> “pulling” or removing obstacles below before they
> could impede (slow) the
> acceleration of falling objects from above.
> Sequenced explosions, on the
> other
> hand, explain why the lower floors did not interfere
> with the progress of
> the
> falling objects above. The pancake theory fails this
> test.
>
> If we put the murder of 2,749 innocent victims
> momentarily aside, the only
> unusual technical feature of the collapses of the
> twin towers was that the
> explosions began at the top, immediately followed by
> explosions from below.
> WTC-7, by contrast, was entirely conventional,
> imploding from bottom up.
>
> It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a
> scientific debate over the
> cause(s)
> of the collapse of the twin towers and building 7.
> If the official wisdom
> on the
> collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy
> based on such erroneous
> engineering analysis is not likely prove to be
> sound. Revised engineering
> and
> construction practices, for example, based on the
> belief that the twin
> towers
> collapsed through airplane damage and subsequent
> fires is premature, to say
> the
> least.
>
> More importantly, momentous political and social
> consequences would follow
> if
> impartial observers concluded that professionals
> imploded the WTC. If
> demolition
> destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade
> Center on 9/11, then
> the
> case for an “inside job” and a government attack on
> America would be
> compelling.
> Meanwhile, the job of scientists, engineers and
> impartial researchers
> everywhere
> is to get the scientific and engineering analysis of
> 9/11 right, “though
> heaven
> should fall.” Unfortunately, getting it right in
> today’s “security state”
> demands daring because explosives and structural
> experts have been
> intimidated
> in their analyses of the collapses of 9/11.
>
> Morgan Reynolds, Ph.D., is professor emeritus at
> Texas A&M; University and
> former
> director of the Criminal Justice Center at the
> National Center for Policy
> Analysis headquartered in Dallas, TX. He served as
> chief economist for the
> US
> Department of Labor during 2001–2, George W. Bush’s
> first term.
>

6) This is a follow-up to the previous 9/11 Story:

Thursday, June 30, 2005
http://www.lewisnews.com/article.asp?ID=105580

Bush Insider Claim WTC Collapse Bogus Gets ‘Huge
Response’ And Read By Millions Worldwide

Posted on: 6/28/2005 7:37:00 AM –
Columnist By Greg Szymanski

When Morgan Reynolds called the official story about
9/11 bogus, it seemed like the whole world stopped for
a moment to listen.

It seemed like a lighting bolt hit the heart of the
government story, cracking it into a million
unexplainable pieces.

And when the dust settled from his explosive
tatements, the highest-ranking member of the Bush team
to make such an accusation said he wasn’t expecting
any “invitations to the White House anytime soon.”

Two weeks ago, the former chief economist in the Labor
Department during President Bush’s first term told the
world he thought the WTC fell from a controlled
demolition, indicating 9/11 was “an inside government
job.”

Reynolds, a respected econ
omist and former Republican
conservative, made his claims after researching many
aspects of 9/11, including scientific and engineering
data for and against the government story.

He presented his findings on the Internet in a long,
detailed article, concluding:
“It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a
scientific debate over the cause(s) of the collapse of
the twin towers and Building 7. If the official
wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is,
then policy based on such erroneous engineering
analysis is not likely to be correct either.

“The government’s collapse theory is highly vulnerable
on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears
to account for the full range of facts associated with
the collapse of the three buildings.

“More importantly, momentous political and social
consequences would follow if impartial observers
concluded that professionals imploded the WTC.
Meanwhile, the job of scientists, engineers and
impartial researchers everywhere is to get
the scientific and engineering analysis of 9/11
right.”

Considering his place among the Republican faithful,
once the media got its “claws into his controversial
remarks,” his words quickly spread with the help
of cyberspace like an out of control wildfire.

Not only did millions read his story on the Internet,
but Reynolds controversial comments then drew instant
attention from numerous mainstream newspapers, radio
and television stations, including UPI, MSNBC, FOX
News and over a dozen other major market local radio
and TV stations.

It was a story that “grew wings,” a story Reynolds
never expected would get so much attention and such a
large audience.

“I had a huge response and it really was amazing. I
never expected so many people to respond so
passionately,” said Reynolds this week in a telephone
interview. “I literally received hundreds and hundred
of emails, some agreeing with me and others, of
course, disagreeing.

“After it was all said and done, as things are
starting to finally quiet down now, I would guess it
was about 5 to 1 in favor of what I was saying.
However, I never imagined how much support there was
out there for what I was suggesting occurred on 9/11.”

Without mincing words, as he did in his article,
Reynolds quickly changed the subject, again placing
the blame squarely on the government for not coming
clean about what happened on 9/11, saying it’s important to get to the bottom of a “story that dwarfs all others in comparison.”

“What it boils down to is that the government and the
mainstream media are not digging into the 9/11
controversy because they are hiding something,” said
Reynolds. “From a media point of view, it’s the story
of the century and they are not even trying to connect
the dots.”

Continuing to throw some punches at his former
employer, he added:

“It’s nothing new. The government has always lied
about so many things. Look at the Downing Street Memo,
for example, the document confirming that the Bush
administration lied to us about its motives for
getting into the war.

” If they lied to us about this, what else? Well, 9/11
is just another example.”

To add more fuel to the hot 9/11 controversy, William
Rodriguez, the WTC janitor who heard and felt a strong
explosion in the basement levels of the north tower
just seconds before the jetliner crashed into the top
floors, recently came forward to tell his story,
adding further credibility to Reynolds’ conclusions.

Rodriguez claims a massive underground explosion
brought down the towers. His story is strengthened
further by 14 other eye witnesses who can verify his
claims, as well as a burn victim from the basement
explosion who he helped to safety.

Immediately following 9/11, Rodriguez tried to tell
his story, but claims the 9/11 Commission and the
mainstream media have systematically censored his
words in order to protect the official government
story, a story ignoring the possibility of explosives
being used to bring down the WTC.

Commenting on Rodriguez, Reynolds said: “It’s not a
coincidence that there was first an explosion below
and then the jetliner explosion seconds later above.
At least there should have been a thorough
investigation since the timing of the explosions
strikes me as an impossibility if you believe, as the government contends, that only a jetliner brought down the towers.”

Reynolds added that nobody from the Bush administration has officially contacted him about his
statements suggesting 9/11 was an “inside job,” but
said he was aware that “administration operatives” have carried his message into the halls of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

“How high up it went, I just don’t know,” he added.

Asked if he was going to continue to research and
write about 9/11, Reynolds said: “Yes, of course, I
see it as a citizen’s duty and I hope to do some more
writing on the subject very soon.”

7) Could this be another sign that the mood is shifting in the US (or is it just humor?):

A lobbyist, on his way home from work in Washington, D.C., came to a dead halt in traffic and thought to himself, “Wow, this seems worse than usual.”

He noticed a police officer walking between the lines of stopped cars, so he rolled down his window and asked, “Officer, what’s the hold-up?”

The officer replied, “The President is depressed, so he stopped his motorcade and is threatening to douse himself with gasoline and set himself on fire. He says no one believes his stories about why we went to war in Iraq, or the connection between Saddam and al-Qaeda, or that his tax cuts will help anyone except his wealthy friends; the press called him on the lie about Iraq, and now with the Downing Street Memo and four others that prove he planned on war a year before telling the public, he’s gone off the deep-end. So we’re taking up a collection for him.”

The lobbyist asks, “How much have you got so far?”

The officer replies, “About 14 gallons, but a lot of folks are still siphoning.”

1) Guest editorial on Juan Cole’s blog — and this one couldn’t have been done better:

www.juancole.com

Guest Opinion: Iraq Avalanche Unstoppable: Richards

“The Iraq Avalanche Cannot be Stopped”

by Alan Richards

University of California Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz, CA
June 24, 2005

I have been reading the debate . . . on “What next in Iraq?” (“Unilateral withdrawal? UN forces? Staying the course?”) with great interest. There is a way, however, in which I am troubled by what I perceive as a tacit assumption–a very American assumption,–underlying most of the discussion. It seems to me that even “pessimists” are actually “optimists”: they assume that there exists in Iraq and the Gulf some “solution”, some course of action which can actually lead to an outcome other than widespread, prolonged violence, with devastating economic, political, and social consequences.

I regret to say that I think this is wrong. There is no “solution” to this mess; it is sometimes not possible to “fix” things which have been broken. I can see no course of action which will prevent widespread violence, regional social upheaval, and economic hammering administered by oil price shocks. This is why so many of us opposed the invasion of Iraq so strenuously in the first place! We thought that it would unleash irreversible adverse consequences for (conventionally defined) US interests in the region. I am very sorry to say that I still think we were right.

Let me get specific:

1) As you have often pointed out, our continued presence de-legitimizes the current Iraqi government, which is, in any case, largely a Shiite Islamist and Kurdish tactical alliance. As Patrick Cockburn has pointed out (London Review of Books), the Kurds destabilized Iraq for half a century, and the Sunnis can certainly do the same. No Sunnis, no deal, no way-as you have repeatedly stressed. And the polls, which you courageously cite, which show some 40% of the population backing the insurgents, at least in principle,demonstrates-as you have repeatedly argued-that a large number of Iraqis want us to get out. This means, as you say almost every day, that our current policy (“unilateral presence”, if I may call it that) is unsustainable. The insurgents, and many Iraqis, want us out, by any means.Our continued presence cannot succeed.

2) Your scenario for a regional Lebanese or Thirty Years? War style conflict in the wake of a precipitous U.S. withdrawal seems very plausible. Indeed, since I think that the U.S. cannot stay, and since I (regrettably) think that the U.N. option is also not viable (for some of the reasons your correspondents have stated), such a scenario may be the most prescient prediction. But the U.S., as a polity and culture, will simply not sustain this war, not without huge damage to other interests, to the military itself, and to what remains of American democracy. Our continued presence only postpones the evil day, and the U.N. is not, I think, likely to step in.

3) Salafi jihadis and Iran are the big winners in all this-and they hate each other. I can see NO possible way for outsiders to defuse this: not with the U.S. in Iraq, not with the U.N., not with a power vacuum. People from outside the region (U.S., E.U., U.N., India, China, whoever) can do very, very little about this. It seems to me that, as usual, only Muslims can ameliorate the problems of Muslim governance.

4) Finally, there is a tacit assumption in the discussion so far that low oil prices, including current levels, are viable. I don’t think this is true, for at least two reasons. A) The terrifying truth is that how we consume energy now both in the U.S. and elsewhere is entirely unsustainable for environmental reasons. Denial is the national past-time on this; and it is deeply destructive. Global warming is a reality, it will get worse, and the consequences will be extremely serious. I now work surrounded by biologists and environmental scientists, many of whom would cheer (even as they paid a heavy price in lost jobs and income) if the price of oil hit $100 a barrel, because they are in a panic about the consequences of our current profligate behavior. B) The jury is still out on the “Hubbert’s Peak” or “Peak Oil” hypothesis, but the viewpoint is hardly silly. If it should prove to be correct, oil prices will rise, steeply-until we get serious about fostering the kind of changes in consumption and technology which are necessary, in any case (see A). To repeat: assuming that low oil prices are viable is very dubious at best, and at worst, constitutes a species of denial.

5) Who will pay the price for high oil prices? As you rightly say, poor people, especially in the Global South. Will they know this? Certainly. Will they thank rich countries like us? Hardly. Might this lead to other violent social movements, particularly given all the other problems in the Global South? I can’t see why not. Of course, there are ways in principle of dealing with this problem which could minimize the pain. Every competent economist knows the litany of price changes, technology subsidies, and quantitative mandates which we should have implemented, decades ago. We should still do this now, even at this late date. Of course, every indication suggests that the necessary steps will not be taken, thanks, in large part, to American culture and politics. After all, no one, from either party, in the political arena is saying anything even remotely commensurate with the threat which most scientists see to the future of the planet. No one with any power is talking sensibly about energy use, global poverty, and their interrelationships. No one at all.

6) My last pessimistic point: my reading of history is that the only way large changes occur is as responses to large crises. I don’t like this, but it seems true to me. And, I hasten to add, change in a crisis is hardly guaranteed to be humane, decent, or to have any claim on our ethical allegiance. We might get a new Roosevelt, but we also might get a new Hitler.

Please don’t misunderstand me: I am not advocating regional-crisis-cum-oil-price-spike. I simply think that it is probably unavoidable. If we leave, there will be violence, mayhem, slaughter, and instability, and if we stay there will be violence, mayhem, slaughter, and instability. If there is (as I tend to think) a large crisis looming on the horizon, it will certainly be ugly, even hideous. And then-something else will happen. The one thing I don?t think is possible is to avoid it.

So let me close where I began: I think it is delusional to imagine that there exists a “solution” to the mess in Iraq. From this perspective, the folly of Bush, Cheney and Company in invading Iraq is even worse than most informed observers of the region already think. Starting an avalanche is certainly criminal. It does not follow, however, that such a phenomenon can be stopped once it has begun.

2) Ash launches some great zingers in this article, like comparing Bush’s statement that “we have to prevent Iraq becoming like Afghanistan” to a guy who shoots himself in the foot and then says “I have to shoot myself in the foot to prevent it becoming gangrenous.” He also says, “you can fool some of the Americans all of the time, all of the Americans some of the time, but you can’t fool most of the Americans most of the time — even with Fox News.” Spot on:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1517879,00.html

The sobering of America

US foreign policy is getting better – and that’s partly because Iraq has got worse

Timothy Garton Ash
Thursday June 30, 2005
The Guardian

To return to America after an absence of six months is to find a nation sobered by reality. The reality of debt and lost jobs. The reality of rising China. Above all, the reality of Iraq.

This new sobriety was exemplified by President Bush’s speech at Fort Bragg on
Tuesday night. Beforehand, as the camera panned across row upon row of soldiers in red berets, the television commentator warned us that the speech might last a long time, since it was likely to be interrupted by numerous rounds of heartfelt applause from this loyal military audience. In fact, the audience interrupted him with applause just once. Once! Lines that during last autumn’s election rallies drummed up a certain storm (“We will not allow our future to be determined by car bombers and assassins”) were now met with a deafening silence. Stolidly they sat, the serried soldiers, clean-shaven, square-jawed, looking slightly bored and, in at least one case that I spotted, rhythmically chewing gum….

3) Would like to meet this fellow’s lawyers:

http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/06/29/checkpoint.lawsuit.ap/index.html

Muslim sues Homeland Security for delays

Wednesday, June 29, 2005; Posted: 1:22 p.m. EDT (17:22 GMT)

CHICAGO, Illinois (AP) — A U.S.-born Muslim who says he was unjustly detained and questioned at customs checkpoints has sued the Department of Homeland Security over the “degrading process.”

In the complaint filed in Chicago federal court, Akifur Rahman said customs agents held him for several hours on four occasions since March 2004 while he was re-entering the country from abroad, even though he had proper identification.

Rahman said he’s “afraid of what may happen every time I return from a trip outside the United States.”

“This lawsuit seems to be the only way to … insure that this degrading process is not repeated,” Rahman read from a statement.

According to his lawsuit, Rahman, of suburban Wheaton, received a letter from the Department of Homeland Security in April saying his problems stemmed from an “unfortunate misidentification” in which his name could be a near match of someone on a government watch list.

The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages and “the adoption of adequate policies to ensure the reasonably expeditious re-entry” of U.S. citizens whose names are similar or identical to those on watch lists.

The complaint names several Homeland Security officials and employees, including Secretary Michael Chertoff and former Secretary Tom Ridge.

Cherise Miles, a spokeswoman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, part of the Department of Homeland Security, said the agency does not comment on pending litigation.

American Civil Liberties Union attorneys representing Rahman are seeking class-action status for the lawsuit.

4) Onion Article:

http://onion.com/2056-06-22/news/1/

MECCA—The 14 democratic member nations of the Middle Eastern Union unanimously voted to declare war on the U.S. Monday, calling the North American country a “dangerous rogue state that must be contained.”…

www.truthtalkz.blogspot.com
www.truthtalkziraq.blogspot.com

1) These are the findings of the World Tribunal on Iraq, which took place last weekend in Istanbul:

Tribunal on Iraq Findings
World Tribunal on Iraq

Monday 27 June 2005

The attack on Iraq is an attack on justice, on liberty, on our safety, on our future, on us all – The Jury of Conscience

Istanbul, 27 June, 2005 – With a Jury of Conscience from 10 different countries hearing the testimonies of 54 members of the Panel of Advocates who came from across the world, including Iraq, the United States and the United Kingdom, this global civil initiative came to an end with a press conference at the Hotel Armada where the chair of the Jury of Conscience, Arundathi Roy, announced the Jury’s conclusions.

The Jury defined this war as one of the most unjust in history: ‘The Bush and Blair administrations blatantly ignored the massive opposition to the war expressed by millions of people around the world. They embarked upon one of the most unjust, immoral, and cowardly wars in history. The Anglo-American occupation of Iraq of the last 27 months has led to the destruction and devastation of the Iraqi state and society. Law and order have broken down completely, resulting in a pervasive lack of human security; the physical infrastructure is in shambles; the health care delivery system is a mess; the education system has ceased to function; there is massive environmental and ecological devastation; and, the cultural and archeological heritage of the Iraqi people has been desecrated.’

On the basis of the preceding findings and recalling the Charter of the United Nations and other legal documents, the jury has established the following charges against the Governments of the US and the UK:

Planning, preparing, and waging the supreme crime of a war of aggression in contravention of the United Nations Charter and the Nuremberg Principles.

Targeting the civilian population of Iraq and civilian infrastructure

Using disproportionate force and indiscriminate weapon systems

Failing to safeguard the lives of civilians during military activities and during the occupation period thereafter

Using deadly violence against peaceful protestors
Imposing punishments without charge or trial, including collective punishment

Subjecting Iraqi soldiers and civilians to torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment

Re-writing the laws of a country that has been illegally invaded and occupied

Willfully devastating the environment

Actively creating conditions under which the status of Iraqi women has seriously been degraded

Failing to protect humanity’s rich archaeological and cultural heritage in Iraq.

Obstructing the right to information, including the censoring of Iraqi media.

Redefining torture in violation of international
law, to allow use of torture and illegal detentions.

The Jury also established charges against the Security Council of United Nations for failing to stop war crimes and crimes against humanity among other failures, against the Governments of the Coalition of the Willing for collaborating in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, against the Governments of Other Countries for allowing the use of military bases and air space and providing other logistical support, against Private Corporations for profiting from the war, against the Major Corporate Media for disseminating deliberate falsehoods and failing to report atrocities.

The Jury also provided a number of recommendations that include recognising the right of the Iraqi people to resist the illegal occupation of their country and to develop independent institutions, and affirming that the right to resist the occupation is the right to wage a struggle for self-determination, freedom, and independence as derived from the Charter of the United Nations, we the Jury of Conscience declare our solidarity with the people of Iraq and the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of the coalition forces from Iraq.

The Istanbul session of the WTI lasted three days and presented testimony on the illegality and criminal violations in the U.S. pretexts for and conduct of this war. The expert opinion, witness testimony, video and image evidence addressed the impact of war on civilians, the torture of prisoners, the unlawful imprisonment of Iraqis without charges or legal defence, the use of depleted uranium weapons, the effects of the war on Iraq’s infrastructure, the destruction of Iraqi cultural institutions and the liability of the invaders in international law for failing to protect these treasures of humanity.

The session in Istanbul was the culminating session of commissions of inquiry and hearings held around the world over the past two years. Sessions on different topics related to the war on Iraq were held in London, Mumbai, Copenhagen, Brussels, New York, Japan, Stockholm, South Korea, Rome, Frankfurt, Geneva, Lisbon and Spain.

They have compiled a definitive historical record of evidence on the illegality of the invasion and occupation that will be recorded in a forthcoming book.

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Preliminary Declaration of the Jury of Conscience World Tribunal on Iraq
Istanbul

27th June 2005, Istanbul

In February 2003, weeks before war was declared on Iraq, millions of people protested in the streets of the world. That call went unheeded. No international institution had the courage or conscience to stand up to the aggression of the US and UK governments. No one could stop them. It is two years later now. Iraq has been invaded, occupied, and devastated. The attack on Iraq is an attack on justice, on liberty, on our safety, on our future, on us all. We the people of conscience decided to stand up. We formed the World Tribunal on Iraq, to demand justice and a peaceful future.

The legitimacy of the World Tribunal on Iraq is located in the collective conscience of humanity. This, the Istanbul session, was the culmination of a series of 20 hearings held in different cities of the world focusing on the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq.

We the Jury of Conscience, from 10 different countries, met in Istanbul. We heard 54 testimonies from a panel of advocates and witnesses who came from across the world, including from Iraq, the United States and the United Kingdom.

The World Tribunal on Iraq met in Istanbul from 24-26th of June 2005. The principal objective of the WTI is to tell the truth about the Iraq war as clearly as possible, and to draw conclusions that underscore the accountability of those responsible and underline the significance of justice for the Iraqi people. Saddam Hussein’s crimes against his people are not the focus of this Tribunal. We believe it is up to the Iraqi people to investigate these crimes in an independent and free trial.

I. Overview

1. The reasons given by the US and UK governments for the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq in March 2003 have proven to be false. The real motive was to control and dominate the Middle East. Establishing hegemony over the Middle East serves the goal of controlling the world’s largest reserves of oil and strengthening the position of the US’s strategic ally Israel.

2. Blatant falsehoods about the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and a link between Al Qaeda terrorism and the Saddam Hussein régime were manufactured in order to create public support for a “preemptive” assault upon a sovereign independent nation.

3. Iraq has been under siege for years. The imposition of severe inhuman economic sanctions at the end of the first Gulf war in 1991; the establishment of no-fly zones in the North
ern and Southern parts of Iraq; and the concomitant bombing of the country were all aimed at degrading and weakening Iraq’s human and material resources and capacities in order to facilitate its subsequent invasion and occupation. In this enterprise the US and British leaderships had the endorsement of a complicit UN Security Council.

4. In pursuit of their agenda of empire, the Bush and Blair blatantly ignored the massive opposition to the war expressed by millions of people around the world. They embarked upon one of the most unjust, immoral, and cowardly wars in history.

5. The Anglo-American occupation of Iraq of the last 27 months has led to the destruction and devastation of the Iraqi state and society. Law and order have broken down completely, resulting in a pervasive lack of human security; the physical infrastructure is in shambles; the health care delivery system is a mess; the education system has ceased to function; there is massive environmental and ecological devastation; and, the cultural and archeological heritage of the Iraqi people has been desecrated.

6. The occupation has intentionally exacerbated ethnic and confessionnal divisions in Iraqi society, with the aim of undermining Iraq’s identity and integrity as a nation. This is in keeping with the fam liar imperial policy of divide and rule.

7. The imposition of the UN sanctions in 1991 caused untold suffering and thousands of deaths. The situation has worsened after the occupation. At least 100,000 civilians have been killed; 60,000 are being held in US custody in inhuman conditions, without charges; thousands have disappeared; and torture has become virtually routine.

8. The privatization, deregulation, and liberalization of the Iraqi economy has transformed the country into a client economy that serves the Washington Consensus. The occupying forces have also accomplished their primary goal of acquired control over the nation’s oil.

9. Any law or institution created under the aegis of occupation is devoid of both legal and moral authority. The recently concluded election, the Constituent Assembly, the current government, and the drafting committee for the Constitution are therefore all illegitimate.

10. There is widespread opposition to the occupation. Political, social, and civil resistance through peaceful means is subjected to repression by the occupying forces. It is the brutality of the occupation that has provoked a strong armed resistance and certain acts of desperation. By the principles embodied in the UN Charter and in international law, the popular national resistance to the occupation is legitimate and justified. It deserves the support of people everywhere who care for justice and freedom.

II. Findings and Charges

On the basis of the preceding findings and recalling the Charter of the United Nations and other legal documents quoted in the appendix, the jury has established the following charges.

A. Against the Governments of the US and the UK

1. Planning, preparing, and waging the supreme crime of a war of aggression in contravention of the United Nations Charter and the Nuremberg Principles.
Evidence for this can be found in the leaked Downing Street Memo of 23rd July, 2002 in which it was revealed that: “military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were fixed around the policy.” Intelligence was manufactured to willfully deceive the people of the US, the UK, and their elected representatives.

2. Targeting the civilian population of Iraq and civilian infrastructure, by intentionally directing attacks upon civilians and hospitals, medical centers, residential neighborhoods, electricity stations, and water purification facilities in violation of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights (“ICCPR”), Articles 7(1)(a), 8(2)(a)(i), and 8(2)(b)(i). The complete destruction of the city of Falluja in itself constitutes a glaring example of such crimes.

3. Using disproportionate force and indiscriminate weapon systems, such as cluster munitions, incendiary bombs, depleted uranium (DU), and chemical weapons. Detailed evidence was presented to the Tribunal by expert witnesses that leukemia had risen sharply in children under the age of five residing in those areas which had been targeted by DU weapons.

4. Failing to safeguard the lives of civilians during military activities and during the occupation period thereafter, in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, Articles 13 and 27, and the ICC Statute, Articles 7 (1)(a) and 8(2)(a)(i). This is evidenced, for example, by “shock and awe” bombing techniques and the conduct of occupying forces at checkpoints.

5. Using deadly violence against peaceful protestors, beginning with, among others, the April 2003 killing of more than a dozen peaceful protestors in Falluja.

6. Imposing punishments without charge or trial, including collective punishment, on the people of Iraq, in violation of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Geneva Conventions, and customary international law requiring due process. Repeated testimonies pointed to “snatch and grab” operations, disappearances, and assassinations.

7. Subjecting Iraqi soldiers and civilians to torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment in violation of the Geneva Conventions, the ICCPR, other treaties and covenants, and customary international law. Degrading treatment includes subjecting Iraqi soldiers and civilians to acts of racial, ethnic, religious, and gender discrimination, as well as denying Iraqi soldiers Prisoner of War status as required by the Geneva Convention. Abundant testimony was provided of unlawful arrests and detentions, without due process of law. Well known and egregious examples occurred in Abu Ghraib prison as well as in Mosul, Camp Bucca, and Basra. The employment of mercenaries and private contractors to carry out torture has served to undermine accountability.

8. Re-writing the laws of a country that has been illegally invaded and occupied, in violation of international covenants on the responsibilities of occupying powers, in order to amass illegal profits (through such measures as Order 39, signed by L. Paul Bremer III for the Coalition Provisional Authority, which allows foreign investors to buy and takeover Iraq’s state-owned enterprises and to repatriate 100 percent of their profits and assets at any point) and to control Iraq’s oil. Evidence listed a number of corporations that had profited from such transactions.

9. Willfully devastating the environment, contaminating it by depleted uranium (DU) weapons, combined with the plumes from burning oil wells, as well as huge oil spills, and destroying agricultural lands. Deliberately disrupting the water and waste removal systems, in a manner verging on biological-chemical warfare. Failing to prevent the looting and dispersal of radioactive material from nuclear sites. Extensive documentation is available on air, water pollution, land degradation, and radiological pollution.

10. Actively creating conditions under which the status of Iraqi women has seriously been degraded contrary, to the repeated claims of the leaders of the coalition forces. Women’s freedom of movement has been severely limited, restricting their access to education, livelihood, and social engagement. Testimony was provided that sexual violence and sex trafficking have increased since the occupation of Iraq began.

11. Failing to protect humanity’s rich archaeological and cultural heritage in Iraq, by allowing the looting of museums and established historical sites and positioning military bases in culturally and archeologically sensitive locations. This took place despite prior warning
s from UNESCO and Iraqi museum officials.

12. Obstructing the right to information, including the censoring of Iraqi media, such as newspapers (e.g., al-Hawza, al-Mashriq, and al-Mustaqila) and radio stations (Baghdad Radio), targeting international journalists, imprisoning and killing academics, intellectuals and scientists.

13. Redefining torture in violation of international law, to allow use of torture and illegal detentions, including holding more than 500 people at Guantánamo Bay without charging them or allowing them any access to legal protection, and using “extraordinary renditions” to send people to torture in other countries known to commit human rights abuses and torture prisoners.

B. Against the Security Council of United Nations

1. Failing to protect Iraq against a crime of aggression.

2. Imposing harsh economic sanctions on Iraq, despite knowledge that sanctions were directly contributing to the massive loss of civilian lives and harming innocent civilians.

3. Allowing the United States and United Kingdom to carry out illegal bombings in the no-fly zones, using false pretense of enforcing UN resolutions, and at no point allowing discussion in the Security Council of this violation, and thereby being complicit and responsible for loss of civilian life and destruction of Iraqi infrastructure.

4. Allowing the United States to dominate the United Nations and hold itself above any accountability by other member nations.

5. Failure to stop war crimes and crimes against humanity by the United States and its coalition partners in Iraq.

6. Failure to hold the United States and its coalition partners accountable for violations of international law during the occupation, and giving official recognition to the occupation, thereby legitimizing an illegal invasion and becoming a collaborator in an illegal occupation.

C. Against the Governments of the Coalition of the Willing
Collaborating in the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

D. Against the Governments of Other Countries
Allowing the use of military bases and air space, and providing other logistical support, for the invasion and occupation.

E. Against Private Corporations
Profiting from the war with complicity in the crimes described above, of invasion and occupation.

F. Against the Major Corporate Media

1. Disseminating the deliberate falsehoods spread by the governments of the US and the UK and failing to adequately investigate this misinformation. This even in the face of abundant evidence to the contrary. Among the corporate media houses that bear special responsibility for promoting the lies about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, we name the New York Times, in particular their reporter Judith Miller, whose main source was on the payroll of the CIA. We also name Fox News, CNN and the BBC.

2. Failing to report the atrocities being committed against Iraqi people by the occupying forces.

III. Recommendations

Recognising the right of the Iraqi people to resist the illegal occupation of their country and to develop independent institutions, and affirming that the right to resist the occupation is the right to wage a struggle for self-determination, freedom, and independence as derived from the Charter of the United Nations, we the Jury of Conscience declare our solidarity with the people of Iraq.

We recommend:

1. The immediate and unconditional withdrawal of the coalition forces from Iraq;

2. That coalition governments make war reparations and pay compensation to Iraq for the humanitarian, economic, ecological, and cultural devastation they have caused by their illegal invasion and occupation;

3. That all laws, contracts, treaties, and institutions established under occupation which the Iraqi people deem inimical to their interests, should be considered null and void;

4. That the Guantanamo Bay prison and all other offshore US military prisons be closed immediately; that the names of the prisoners be disclosed, that they receive POW status, and receive due process;

5. That there be an exhaustive investigation of those responsible for crimes of aggression and crimes against humanity in Iraq, beginning with George W. Bush, President of the United States of America; Tony Blair, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom; and other government officials from the coalition of the willing;

6. That we initiate a process of accountability to hold those morally and personally responsible for their participation in this illegal war, such as journalists who deliberately lied, corporate media outlets that promoted racial, ethnic and religious hatred, and CEOs of multinational corporations that profited from this war;

7. That people throughout the world launch actions against US and UK corporations that directly profit from this war. Examples of such corporations include Halliburton, Bechtel, Carlyle, CACI Inc., Titan Corporation, Kellog, Brown and Root (subsidiary of Halliburton), DynCorp, Boeing, ExxonMobil, Texaco, British Petroleum. The following companies have sued Iraq and received “reparation awards”: Toys R Us, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Shell, Nestlé, Pepsi, Phillip Morris, Sheraton, Mobil. Such actions may take the form of direct actions such as shutting down their offices, consumer boycotts, and pressure on shareholders to divest.

8. That soldiers exercise conscience and refuse to enlist and participate in an illegal war. Also that countries provide conscientious objectors political asylum.

9. That the international campaign for dismantling all US military bases abroad be reinforced.

10. That people around the world resist and reject any effort by any of their governments to provide material, logistical, or moral support to the occupation of Iraq.

We, the Jury of Conscience, hope that the specificity of these recommendations will lay the groundwork required for a world where the international institutions will be shaped and reshaped by the will of people and not fear and self-interest, where journalists and intellectuals will not remain mute, where the will of the people of the world will be central, and human security will prevail over state security and corporate profits.

Appendix: List of Legal Documents
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948)
The Convention on the Political Rights of Women (1952)
The Declaration of the Rights of the Child (1959)
The Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (1963)
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966)
The Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979)
The Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (1984)
The Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989)
The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (1998)
The European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (1950)
The American Convention on Human Rights (1969)
The Code of Conduct for the Armed Forces of the United States of America (1963)

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2) The Iraqi government has politely asked the UN and Kuwait to end the UN scheme for compensating Kuwait for the 1990 invasion. Iraqi compensation to Kuwait made sense until March 2003, when Kuwait allowed its territory to be used by US/UK forces to invade Iraq without cause or legal justification. Since that event, Kuwait owes Iraq compensation — far more compensation than the 32 Billion USD cited in this article as outstanding on Iraq’s part for the 1990 invasion. Kuwait had best concede these payments — or the next time Iraq invades Kuwait there won’t be a building, well,
or living being left alive in Kuwait when they’re done:

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L28715290.htm

Iraq wants to end to U.N. war compensation scheme
28 Jun 2005 16:20:10 GMT

Source: Reuters
By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA, June 28 (Reuters) – Iraq called on Tuesday for
an end to a United Nations-run programme that diverts
part of its oil earnings to pay compensation for
damage caused by its 1990 invasion of Kuwait and the
1991 Gulf War.

However, it said it was ready to negotiate claims on a
bilateral basis with individual countries, notably
Kuwait.

Iraq still owes $32.9 billion in awards approved by
the U.N. Compensation Commission (UNCC), whose
Governing Council is this week considering a further
$50 billion in demands for environmental damage. Five
percent of Iraqi oil revenues goes to finance the
awards.

“We suggest we stop the payments of five percent from
oil revenues…it is too much for us,” Iraqi Deputy
Foreign Minister Mohammed Hamud Bidan told Reuters.

“We think it is time now to stop and leave Iraq to
negotiate directly with the states concerned,” he
added before addressing a council meeting.

These states should heed the example of the Paris Club
of Western countries and Russia which agreed last
November to slash 80 percent of Iraq’s debt to it, he
added.

Like Iraq’s former foes Kuwait and Iran, ordinary
Iraqis were also “victims of the Saddam Hussein
regime”, and the country needed funds for its own
reconstruction, he said.

However, in a speech to the closed-door talks obtained
by Reuters, Kuwait called for “political support…to
ensure uninterrupted payments” to all successful
claimants.

It is the last session of the council, composed of the
same 15 member states as the U.N. Security Council, to
approve further payouts. Those already authorised will
take decades to complete at the current payout rate of
$200 million per quarter.

The commission has received $354 billion in claims
from individuals, corporations and governments and has
approved $52.1 billion since beginning work in 1991.

It has paid out $19.2 billion. The bulk of the
“backlog” of $32.9 billion is owed to Kuwait, UNCC
officials said.

U.N. internal auditors, in reports made public last
January, alleged that the Geneva-based body overpaid
up to $5 billion to claimants — charges that the UNCC
strongly denies.

Final mega-claims are still on the table. Demands for
$50 billion in compensation for damage to the
environment are being sought by six of Iraq’s
neighbours — Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Jordan,
Syria and Turkey — at the three-day session.

“A modest amount will be approved,” a UNCC source
said.

The Iraqi delegation held 30-minute talks with Khaled
Ahmad Al-Mudhaf, chairman of Kuwait’s Public Authority
for Assessment of Compensation for Damages Resulting
from Iraqi Aggression.

“Their reaction now was positive but we need to speak
about details case by case. Maybe they will accept to
speak about government compensation but not
individuals,” Bidan said.

However, the Kuwaiti delegation appeared surprised by
the move, which came ahead of a donors’ meeting
scheduled for mid-July in Amman to discuss aid to
Iraq.

“We do not agree to dropping compensation
completely…The issue of compensation is in the hands
of the U.N.,” Al-Mudhaf told Reuters.

3) I’d like to see someone publish the 13 names of the CIA operatives indicted for extradition here — in case any of us have run across any of those folks at any time in our travels:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5104854,00.html

Italy Wants to Extradite 13 CIA Officials

Tuesday June 28, 2005 8:46 PM
By VICTOR L. SIMPSON

ROME (AP) – Italian prosecutors want to extradite 13
CIA officials accused of kidnapping a radical Muslim
cleric and transporting him to Egypt where he
reportedly was tortured, and they’ve asked Interpol to
help track down the Americans, a court official said
Tuesday.

A man identified as the former CIA station chief in
Milan is among the 13, according to a report by the
judge who issued the arrest warrants. The American was
traced by cell phone records to Egypt in the days
after the abduction when the cleric was “likely
undergoing the first” rounds of torture, according to
the report obtained by The Associated Press.

The Egyptian preacher was snatched in 2003,
purportedly as part of the CIA’s “extraordinary
rendition” program in which terror suspects are
transferred to third countries without court approval,
subjecting them to possible ill treatment.

The order for the arrests in the transfer of the
cleric – made public last Friday – was a rare public
objection to the practice by a close American ally in
its war on terrorism.

The leftist opposition said Premier Silvio
Berlusconi’s government will respond in parliament
Thursday to their demands to know whether Italian
officials were involved.

“It appears to be the most serious violation of
national sovereignty in the history of the republic,”
said opposition deputy Marco Minniti.

Court officials said they had no evidence of Italian
involvement, but Vince Cannistraro, a former leading
counterterrorism official in the CIA, said he doubted
the U.S. government would launch such an operation in
an allied country without coordinating first with the
government.

“No question,” he told AP in Washington, adding the
government may look the other way, as happened in
Sweden when two suspected Islamic terrorists were
handed over to Americans.

Prosecutors have asked the help of Interpol in tracing
the suspects, all identified as U.S. citizens, said
the court official who asked that his name not be used
because the investigation is still under way. The
Milan prosecutor’s office, in announcing the arrests
last week, also said it would ask for American and
Egyptian assistance in the case.

The judge’s 213-page order explaining the need for the
arrests said the suspects’ links to “foreign
intelligence services” gave them the particular
ability to destroy evidence and disrupt the
investigation.

The 13 are accused of seizing Osama Moustafa Hassan
Nasr, known as Abu Omar, on a Milan street on Feb. 17,
2003, and sending him to Egypt, Milan prosecutor
Manlio Claudio Minale said. He was taken to Aviano, a
joint U.S.-Italian air base north of Venice, flown to
Ramstein, another U.S. base in Germany, and then on to
Egypt, according to the prosecutor’s report.

One of the suspects played a key role, according to
the judge’s order, which identifies him as the former
Milan CIA station chief, Robert Seldon Lady, 51. It
said he had been listed as a diplomat, but was retired
and living near Turin.

The report by Judge Chiara Nobili said there was
“serious circumstantial evidence” against the former
station chief based on his cell phone contacts with
other alleged members of the CIA group, including
calls putting him in Egypt in the days following the
kidnapping.

In the report, Nobili said the cell phone records show
Lady was in Egypt from Feb. 22 to March 15, and those
were likely the first days Nasr was being tortured
during interrogations.

Attempts by AP to reach Lady for comment were
unsuccessful. His whereabouts were not
known. Italian
police raided his house Thursday, but he was not
there, Italian newspapers reported.

Some of the 13 names listed in the order might be
aliases because that is often a practice of such
operatives overseas. Several gave U.S. post office
boxes as their addresses.

The U.S. Embassy in Rome, the CIA and Egyptian
officials declined to comment.

The judge’s report details how investigators followed
a trail of credit card information and U.S. addresses
the operatives gave to five-star hotels in Milan
around the time of Nasr’s alleged abduction. The
report also said two pairs of agents took a Venice
holiday after delivering the Egyptian at Aviano,
noting that only the CIA would have such access to the
base.

It said the group had a “particular operational
capacity, economic means and technology.”

Nasr, 42, spoke of his alleged torture in Egypt during
an intercepted cell-phone call to his wife. He
reportedly was hung upside down and subjected to
extreme temperatures and noise that damaged his
hearing.

U.S. officials have defended the practice of
“extraordinary rendition,” saying they receive
assurances that terror suspects handed over to foreign
governments won’t be tortured. They have acknowledged,
though, that once a transfer occurs, the United States
has little control.

The Milan prosecutor’s office has called the imam’s
disappearance a blow to Italy’s terrorism
investigation. Nasr was believed to have fought in
Afghanistan and Bosnia, and prosecutors were seeking
evidence against him before his disappearance,
according to a report in La Repubblica newspaper last
year, which cited intelligence officials.

4) Tal Afar analysis. Here is the kind of analysis we really need to hear more of, but don’t. It’s the kind of analysis that real government bureaucrats read, and don’t bother to share with the rest of is. It’s the kind of analysis adults consider, not the shingles that Bush keeps throwing out there about “terrorism”, etc. It’s from an anonymous source (probably military intelligence) posted on Juan Cole’s website:

www.juancole.com

Tel Afar and the North

We have not heard much lately about the US campaign in the northern, largely Turkmen city of Tel Afar. The city has been a perennial security problem. There is evidence of local Turkmen guerrilla groups cooperating with Arab guerrillas, and the city seems to be part of an underground railway for the infiltration of foreign jihadis from Syria. An informed observer with experience in Iraq explains the dynamics of ethnic and religious disputes in the Iraqi north, especially among the Turkmen:

“Quick clarification on your June 16th post regarding Tel Afar. The US and the Iraqi forces are having such a hard time because the Turkmen in Tel Afar are actually Sunni, not Shia’. They are nearly all Ottoman-era Sunni migrants, rather than Shia’ descendants of the Akqoyunlu and Karaqoyunlu tribes who make up a majority of Turkmen in Kirkuk.

While the Ba’ath used tribal proxies everywhere, they generally recruited “direct hires” in the security services from a much narrower base in specific communities. Nearly all Turkmen who had significant positions in Ba’ath security were from Tel Afar. Tel Afar had land conflicts with the Kurdish Mirani tribe – who were allies of Mustafa Barzani – and backed the government in the Kurdish wars of the 60’s and 70’s. Saddam subsequently recruited heavily in Tel Afar for Maktab al-Amin positions because many of them speak Kurdish. Tel Afar will remain an insurgent stronghold because it is historically as much a Ba’athist city as any city of the same size in al-Anbar.

The Turkmen-Kurdish conflict in Kirkuk is a little different. Unlike in Tel Afar, Turkmen in Kirkuk are unlikely to join the present insurgency because they really dislike both the Ba’athists and the Sunni jihadist types. The Turkmen in Kirkuk are a minor impediment to Kurdish control over the oil but the Kurds are more likely to repress them out of a fear of Turkish government influence. A Turkish special forces team attempted to assassinate the Kurdish governor of Kirkuk in July 2003, in coordination with Turkmen in the city. I’m convinced Kurdish abduction, torture and abuse of Turkmen is intended to intimidate alleged collaborators with Turkey rather than the insurgency. Make no mistake – the Kurds fully intend to be independent, even if it takes another decade. The Kurdish policy in Kirkuk is to control Turkish intrigue long enough for demographics to shift in their favor, without provoking Turkey to the point that they close the border. That occurred when the US accidentally arrested that Turkish hit squad.

. . . I have no doubt that the Kurds are abducting Turkmen, but I also have some suspicions about the objectivity of the [State Department memo] and the scale of the problem. Kurdish abduction and torture of Sunni Arabs is a much more serious problem, but neither the US nor Turkey are likely to protest too strongly. This conflict seems to be on an inevitable and tragic path towards a shadow war in which pesh mergha and the Badr Brigade – maybe wearing Iraqi uniforms, maybe not – start going after the insurgents using their own methods and tactics. Both the U.S. and Turkey have an incentive to draw the line if Turkmen are the victims . . .

I don’t support a “shadow war” in which the Kurds and the Shia’ political parties start fighting fire with fire. I think there needs to be pressure on them to prevent abuses, and I think there needs to be rigorous monitoring. But I hope I don’t give the impression of moral equivalence between the pesh mergha and Shia’ parties on the one side, and the former Ba’athist/jihadists on the other. The former are more responsive to public and international opinion and there’s a certain degree of internal self-control that usually places some limits on their behavior. Not to mention Sistani, who . . . deserves the Nobel Prize. The Ba’athists and jihadists are another matter . . .

Interesting history… Too bad the US doesn’t understand it.”

5) Rambo III:

Hostile Fire May Have Downed U.S. Copter
Wednesday June 29, 2005 10:16 AM

By DANIEL COONEY

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) – A U.S. Chinook helicopter that crashed in eastern Afghanistan was likely shot down by hostile fire, and the fate of 17 American servicemembers aboard was unclear, the U.S. military said Wednesday. The Taliban claimed to have attacked the aircraft.

The troops were on a mission against al-Qaida fighters when the helicopter went down Tuesday in a mountainous region near Asadabad, in Kunar province.

“The helicopter was transporting forces into the area as part of Operation Red Wing, which is part of the enduring fight to defeat al-Qaida militants,” a military statement said. “Initial reports indicate the crash may have been caused by hostile fire. The status of the service members is unknown at this time.”….

6) This is the link to a petition in Turkish to save Istanbul’s ferries, against a plan by the municipality to phase them out in favor of hydrofoils purchased from Norway by 2009. The hydrofoils are closed vehicles, and the Istanbul ferry is one of the grand traditions in this town. Please sign, and pass it on — comments in English by internationals would help the cause tremendously. So far, it’s all been local signatures and Turkish comments. As the entire petition is in Turkish, find below some instructions on how to fill it out:

www.vapurumuvermiyorum.org

Hit “destek olun” in the upper left hand corner, then:
Ad (First Name) Soyad (Last Name)
Meslek (Profession) E-posta (E-mail Address)
Yas (Age [don’t ask])
Gorusler (Comments)

7) How bout a little go
od news for a change:

Eminent domain ruling being used to try to seize
Justice Souter’s house

http://www.freestarmedia.com/hotellostliberty2.html

Weare, New Hampshire (PRWEB) Could a hotel be built on
the land owned by Supreme Court Justice David H.
Souter? A new ruling by the Supreme Court
which was supported by Justice Souter himself itself
might allow it. A private developer is seeking to use
this very law to build a hotel on Souter’s land.

Justice Souter’s vote in the “Kelo vs. City of New
London” decision allows city governments to take land
from one private owner and give it to another if the
government will generate greater tax revenue or other
economic benefits when the land is developed by the
new owner.

On Monday June 27, Logan Darrow Clements, faxed a
request to Chip Meany the code enforcement officer of
the Towne of Weare, New Hampshire seeking to start the
application process to build a hotel on 34 Cilley
Hill Road. This is the present location of Mr.
Souter’s home.

Clements, CEO of Freestar Media, LLC, points out that
the City of Weare will certainly gain greater tax
revenue and economic benefits with a hotel on 34
Cilley Hill Road than allowing Mr. Souter to own the
land.

The proposed development, called “The Lost Liberty
Hotel” will feature the “Just Desserts Café” and
include a museum, open to the public, featuring a
permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America.
Instead of a Gideon’s Bible each guest will receive a
free copy of Ayn Rand’s novel “Atlas Shrugged.”

Clements indicated that the hotel must be built on
this particular piece of land because it is a unique
site being the home of someone largely responsible for
destroying property rights for all Americans.

“This is not a prank” said Clements, “The Towne of
Weare has five people on the Board of Selectmen. If
three of them vote to use the power of eminent domain
to take this land from Mr. Souter we can begin our
hotel development.”

Clements’ plan is to raise investment capital from
wealthy pro-liberty investors and draw up
architectural plans. These plans would then be used to
raise investment capital for the project. Clements
hopes that regular customers of the hotel might include supporters of the Institute For Justice and
participants in the Free State Project among others.

8) Monbiot right on the mark, as usual (article a little old now, but still good):

http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/comment/story/0,9828,1214047,00.html

Joy of sex education

America’s virgin soldiers are on their way – ignoring the dangers of abstinence for teenagers

George Monbiot
Tuesday May 11, 2004
The Guardian

The flame of sexual liberation may soon have to be kept alive by us geriatric delinquents. A US evangelical group has announced that next month it will be recruiting British teenagers to its campaign against sex before marriage. In the States, more than a million have taken the pledge. “Great Britain,” the organiser insists, “is fascinated with the idea of sexual abstinence.” In my day such a fellow would have been horsewhipped. Yet young people are flocking to him. Is there no end to the depravity of today’s youth? Not if the US government can help it. The abstinence campaign that hopes to corrupt the morals of our once proud nation – a group called the Silver Ring Thing – has so far received $700,000 from George Bush, as part of his campaign to replace sex education with Victorian values. This year he doubled the federal budget for virginity training, to $270m. In terms of participation, his programme is working. In every other respect it’s a catastrophe.

No one could dispute that thousands of teenagers in Britain and the United States are suffering as a result of sex before marriage. Teenage pregnancies are overwhelmingly concentrated at the bottom of the social scale: the teenage daughters of unskilled manual labourers are 10 times as likely to become pregnant as middle-class girls. According to the United Nations agency Unicef, women born into poverty are twice as likely to stay that way if they have their children too soon. They are more likely to be unemployed, to suffer from depression and to become dependent on alcohol or drugs.

The prevalence of both teenage pregnancy and venereal disease in this country and the US is generally blamed on lax morals and a permissive welfare state. Teenagers are in trouble today, the conservatives who dominate this debate insist, because of the sexual liberation of the 60s and 70s and the willingness of the state to support single mothers. On Sunday, Ann Widdecombe maintained that sex education has “failed”: those who promote it should now “shut up” and leave the welfare of our teenagers to the virginity campaigners. Denny Pattyn, the founder of the Silver Ring Thing, calls this “the cesspool generation – suffering the catastrophic effects of the sexual revolution”. These people have some explaining to do.

Were we to accept the conservatives’ version, we would expect the nations in which sex education and access to contraception are most widespread to be those that suffer most from teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease. The truth is the other way around.

The two western countries at the top of the disaster league, the United States and the United Kingdom, are those in which conservative campaigns are among the strongest and sex education and access to contraception are among the weakest. The US, the UN Population Fund’s figures show, is the only rich nation stuck in the middle of the third world block, with 53 births per 1,000 teenagers – a record worse than those of India, the Philippines and Rwanda. The UK comes next with 20. The nations the conservatives would place at the top of the list are clumped at the bottom. Germany and Norway produce 11 babies per 1,000 teenagers, Finland eight, Sweden and Denmark seven and the Netherlands five.

Unicef’s explanation is pretty unequivocal. Sweden, for example, radically changed its sex education policies in 1975. “Recommendations of abstinence and sex only within marriage were dropped, contraceptive education was made explicit, and a nationwide network of youth clinics was established specifically to provide confidential contraceptive advice and free contraceptives … Over the next two decades, Sweden saw its teenage birth rate fall by 80 per cent.” Sexually transmitted diseases, in contrast to the rising rates in the UK and the US, declined by 40% in the 1990s.

“Studies of the Dutch experience,” Unicef continues, “have concluded that the underlying reason for success has been the combination of a relatively inclusive society with more open attitudes towards sex and sex education, including contraception.” Requests for contraceptives there “are not associated with shame or embarrassment”, and “the media is willing to carry explicit messages” about them that are “designed for young people”. This teeming cesspool has among the lowest abortion and teenage birth rates on earth.

America and the UK, by contrast, are “less inclusive societies” where “contraceptive advice and services may be formally available, but in a ‘closed’ atmosphere of embarrassment and secrecy”. The UK has a higher teenage pregnancy rate not because there is more sex or abortion, but because of “lower rates of contraceptive use”.

The catastrophe afflicting so many teenagers in Britain and America, in other words, has been caused not by liberal teachers, liberated parents and Marie Stopes International, but by those who campaign against early sex education, discourage access to contraceptives and agitate against the social inclusion (income equality, the welfare state) that offers young women better prospects than getting knocked u
p. Abstinence campaigns such as the Silver Ring Thing do delay sexual activity, but when their victims are sucked into the cesspool (nearly all eventually are), they are, according to a study at Columbia University, around one-third less likely to use contraceptives, as they are not “prepared for an experience that they have promised to forgo”. The result, a paper published in the British Medical Journal shows, is that abstinence programmes are “associated with an increase in the number of pregnancies among partners of young male participants”. You read that right: abstinence training increases the rate of teenage pregnancy.

If all this were widely known, the conservatives and evangelicals would never dare to make the claims they do. So they must ensure that we don’t find out. In January, the Sunday Telegraph claimed that Europeans “look on in envy” at the US record on teenage pregnancies. It supported this extraordinary statement by deliberately fudging the figures: running the teenage birth rate per 1,000 in the US against the total teenage birthrate in the UK, so leaving its readers with no means of comparison.

Breathtaking as this deception is, it’s not half as bad as what Bush has been up to. When his cherished abstinence programmes failed to reduce the rate of teenage births, he instructed the US Centres for Disease Control to stop gathering data. He also forced them to drop their project identifying the sex education programmes that work, after they found that none of the successful ones were “abstinence only”. Bush should also hope that we don’t look too closely at his record as governor of Texas. He spent $10m on abstinence campaigns there, with the result that Texas has the fourth-highest rate of HIV infection in the union, and the slowest decline of any state in the birth rate among 15- to 17-year-olds.

So when this bunch of johnny-come-lately foreigners arrives next month with their newfangled talk of “virginity” and “abstinence”, I urge you chaps to lock up your daughters and send them on their way. It’s up to the older generation to keep our young whippersnappers off the straight and narrow.

1) The following is an email message from Beshara Doumani, a Middle East History Professor at Berkeley, concerning a new book by Norman Finkelstein and academic freedom in light of attempts to squelch said book:

Dear Friends:

I want to alert you to a disturbing development on the academic freedom front: It is possible that the University of California Press might not, after all, publish the long-awaited book by Norman Finkelstein’s, Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History. The reason is that UCPress, under pressure from outside political forces as well pressure from inside the UC administration, has asked Norman Finkelstein to make further changes despite and in violation of an earlier commitment to publish the final galleys without any further changes.

This commitment came after a very long and tortuous editing process during which Norman has bent over backwards in accommodating queries by editors, reviewers, and several (nine is the figure I heard) libel lawyers that UCPress consulted. As the article below by Jon Weiner that appears in the current issue of the Nation magazine shows, the book has received excellent reviews by eminent scholars and has been cleared by several lawyers. The new demands seem to be the result not of scholarly concerns, but of intensive lobbying by Alan Dershowitz, the Harvard professor and author of the book, The Case for Israel, which Norman tears apart by showing that every substantive claim the book makes is false. Norman also makes a strong case that Dershowitz is a plagiarist.

My understanding is that the core of the new demands by UCPress is the deletion of any references to plagiarism on the part of Alan Dershowitz, primarily in order to avoid being sued. That is a dangerous abdication of the right of academic freedom and the consequences go well beyond Norman Finkelstein and his book. If the heavy handed tactics succeed in muzzling UCPress and Norman Finkelstein , university presses in general will become very wary of publishing any book critical of Israeli policies or of the apologists for these policies, of which Dershowitz is a prime example. The capitulation of the President and Provost of Columbia University when it comes to what ME professors can teach now may have its publication equivalent.

There is no doubt in my mind that Norman’s book would have been published by now if the normal procedures of peer review were followed. The folks at UCPress, if left alone to do their work freely would have seen this book through. But peer review procedures and academic freedom do not always apply when it comes to critical academic works about Israel. What we have before us here is a naked in-your-face attempt to exercise political muscle in support of bankrupt intellectual arguments.

The article by Jon Weiner below was written before these new developments, hence the assumption that book will be published in its current form. I should also note that despite claims to the contrary, the letters sent by Dershowitz and his lawyers unequivocally aim at suppressing the publication of the book.

It is ironic that when Arnold Schwarzenegger, the governor of California, was asked to intervene on behalf of
Dershowitz and prevent the publication of this book, his office replied that it cannot do so, for this is a clear case of academic freedom. I think it is very important that UCPress and UC administration and its lawyers be reminded that this core principle is at stake and they should not allow outside pressures to dictate the political boundaries of what can or cannot be published.

Beshara
bdoumani@berkeley.edu

2) Dershowitz II:
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20050711&s;=wiener
——————————————————

Giving Chutzpah New Meaning
by JON WIENER
[from the July 11, 2005 issue]

What do you do when somebody wants to publish a book that says you’re completely wrong? If you’re Alan Dershowitz, the prominent Harvard law professor, and the book is Norman Finkelstein’s Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History, you write the governor of California and suggest that he intervene with the publisher–because the publisher is the University of California Press, which conceivably might be subject to the power of the governor.

Schwarzenegger, showing unusual wisdom, declined to act. The governor’s legal affairs secretary wrote Dershowitz, “You have asked for the Governor’s assistance in preventing the publication of this book,” but “he is not inclined to otherwise exert influence in this case because of the clear, academic freedom issue it presents.” In a phone interview Dershowitz denied writing to the Governor, declaring, “My letter to the Governor doesn’t exist.” But when pressed on the issue, he said, “It was not a letter. It was a polite note.”
Old-timers in publishing said they’d never heard of another case where somebody tried to get a governor to intervene in the publication of a book. “I think it’s a first,” said Andre Schiffrin, managing director at Pantheon Books for twenty-eight years and then founder and director of the New Press. Lynne Withey, director of the University of California Press, where she has been for nineteen years, said, “I’ve never heard of such a case in California.”

But if you’re Alan Dershowitz, you don’t stop when the governor declines. You try to get the president of the University of California to intervene with the press. You get a prominent law firm to send threatening letters to the counsel to the university regents, to the university provost, to seventeen directors of the press and to nineteen members of the press’s faculty editorial committee. A typical letter, from Dershowitz’s attorney Rory Millson of Cravath, Swaine & Moore, describes “the press’s decision to publish this book” as “wholly illegitimate” and “part of a conspiracy to defame” Dershowitz. It concludes, “The only way to extricate yourself is immediately to terminate all professional contact with this full-time malicious defamer.” Dershowitz’s own letter to members of the faculty editorial committee calls on them to “reconsider your decision” to recommend publication of the book.

Why would a prominent First Amendment advocate take such an action? Dershowitz told Publishers Weekly that “my goal has never been to stop publication of this book.” He told me in an e-mail, “I want Finkelstein’s book to be published, so that it can be demolished in the court of public opinion.” He told Publishers Weekly his only purpose in writing the people at the University of California Press was “to eliminate as many of the demonstrable falsehoods as possible” from the book before it was published.

Everyone knows who Alan Dershowitz is–the famed Harvard professor, part of the O.J. Simpson defense team, author of the number-one bestseller Chutzpah, portrayed by Ron Silver in the film Reversal of Fortune, about his successful defense of accused wife-murderer Klaus von Bülow. He’s also one of the most outspoken defenders of Israel, especially in his 2003 book The Case for Israel; it reached number twelve on the New York Times bestseller list. That’s the book Finkelstein challenges in Beyond Chutzpah.

Norman Finkelstein is not so famous. The son of Holocaust survivors, he is an assistant professor of political science at DePaul University in Chicago. He’s the often embattled author of several books, of which the best known is The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering–an exposé of what he calls “the blackmail of Swiss banks.” It was originally published by Verso in 2000, with an expanded second edition in 2003, and has been translated into seventeen languages. The book was reviewed in the New York Times Book Review by the distinguished Holocaust hist
orian Omer Bartov, who holds a chair at Brown University; he wrote that the book “is filled with precisely the kind of shrill hyperbole that Finkelstein rightly deplores in much of the current media hype over the Holocaust; it is brimming with the same indifference to historical facts, inner contradictions, strident politics and dubious contextualizations; and it oozes with the same smug sense of moral and intellectual superiority.” (A positive review, written by Neve Gordon, appeared in these pages on November 13, 2000.)

Finkelstein’s Holocaust Industry, however, has some prominent supporters, and not only leftists like Noam Chomsky and Alexander Cockburn. Most significant is Raul Hilberg, the semi-official dean of Holocaust studies and author of the classic The Destruction of the European Jews, who wrote of The Holocaust Industry, “I would now say in retrospect that he was actually conservative, moderate and that his conclusions are trustworthy…. I am by no means the only one who, in the coming months or years, will totally agree with Finkelstein’s breakthrough.”

Dershowitz did not see the manuscript for Beyond Chutzpah before writing his letters, which were based instead on statements Finkelstein had made in interviews and lectures. Dershowitz’s attorney objected first of all to Finkelstein’s statements that Dershowitz “almost certainly didn’t write [The Case for Israel], and perhaps didn’t even read it prior to publication.” He also objected to the charge that Dershowitz is guilty of plagiarism–more on that later–and that “every substantive sentence” in the Dershowitz book “is fraudulent.” Finkelstein has been telling this to anyone who will listen, and wrote as much in an e-mail to me: “I devote some 200 pages to documenting that every substantive fact in the book is a flat-out lie.” (Emphasis in original.)
Now that the “uncorrected pages” of Beyond Chutzpah are being sent out to reviewers, it’s possible to see what Finkelstein’s book actually says. (Disclosure: A senior editor of The Nation served as a freelance editor of Beyond Chutzpah.) The claim that Dershowitz didn’t write The Case for Israel has been removed–the UC Press explained in a statement accompanying review copies that “Professor Finkelstein’s only claim on the issue was speculative. He wondered why Alan Dershowitz, in recorded appearances after his book was published, seemed to know so little about the contents of his own book. We felt this weakened the argument and distracted from the central issues of the book. Finkelstein agreed.”

But the rest of the claims Dershowitz and his attorney railed against are still there: Beyond Chutzpah describes Dershowitz’s Case for Israel as “among the most spectacular academic frauds ever published on the Israel-Palestine conflict.” In Dershowitz’s book, “It’s difficult to find a single claim…that’s not either based on mangling a reputable source or referencing a preposterous one, or simply pulled out of the air.” He charges that Dershowitz “plagiarizes large swaths” of his book from Joan Peters’s From Time Immemorial, whose scholarship Finkelstein had debunked in an earlier book. The introduction concludes by calling The Case for Israel “rubbish.”

The body of Beyond Chutzpah shows Finkelstein to be an indefatigable researcher with a forensic ability to take apart other people’s arguments. The core of the book challenges Dershowitz’s defense of Israel’s human rights record by citing the findings of mainstream groups, including Amnesty International, the Israeli human rights organization B’Tselem and Human Rights Watch.

The most important part of the book examines Israel’s treatment of Palestinian civilians during the second intifada, which began in September 2000. Since then Israel has killed three Palestinians for every Israeli killed. Dershowitz tries to defend this ratio, writing that “when only innocent civilians are counted, significantly more Israelis than Palestinians have been killed.” But Finkelstein cites Amnesty International’s conclusion that “the vast majority of those killed and injured on both sides have been unarmed civilians and bystanders.” That means Israel has killed something like three times as many unarmed civilians and bystanders as Palestinians have.

Dershowitz has a second argument: While Palestinian terrorists have targeted Israeli civilians intentionally, the killing of Palestinian civilians by the Israel Defense Forces is “unintended,” “inadvertent” and “caused accidentally,” because the IDF follows international law, which requires the protection of civilian noncombatants. For example, Dershowitz writes, the IDF tries to use rubber bullets “and aims at the legs whenever possible” in a policy designed to “reduce fatalities.” But Finkelstein’s evidence to the contrary is convincing: Amnesty International reported in 2001 that “the overwhelming majority of cases of unlawful killings and injuries in Israel and the Occupied Territories have been committed by the IDF using excessive force.” Amnesty cited the use of “helicopters in punitive rocket attacks where there was no imminent danger to life.” As for the rubber bullets, Amnesty reported in 2002 that the IDF “regularly” used them against demonstrators who were children “at distances considerably closer than the minimum permitted range…and the pattern of injury indicates that IDF practice has not been to aim at the legs of demonstrators, as the majority of injuries suffered by children from rubber-coated bullets are to the upper body and the head.”
Another of Dershowitz’s examples of Israeli protection of Palestinian civilians concerns Hamas leader Salah Shehadeh. Dershowitz writes that on several occasions, the army passed up opportunities to attack him “because he was with his wife or children.” But in July 2002 an Israeli F-16 dropped a one-ton bomb on Shehadeh’s apartment building in Gaza City, killing Shehadeh and fourteen Palestinian civilians, nine of whom were children.

Most of Beyond Chutzpah consists of these kinds of juxtapositions–arguments by Dershowitz on Israeli practices of torture, assassinations, treatment of Palestinian children, and water and land rights, refuted by documentation from human rights organizations. The cumulative effect is a devastating portrait of widespread Israeli violations of human rights principles and international law.

Finkelstein has won support for his book from leading scholars, whose statements appear in the book’s publicity materials: Baruch Kimmerling, who holds a chair in sociology at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and whose book on Palestinian history was published by Harvard University Press, calls Beyond Chutzpah “the most comprehensive, systematic and well documented work of its kind.” Sara Roy of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard, whose book on political Islam in Palestine has just been published by Princeton University Press, calls Beyond Chutzpah “a vigorous, intelligent, succinct and powerfully argued analysis.” Avi Shlaim, professor of international relations at Oxford, calls it a work of “erudition, originality, spark, [and] meticulous attention to detail.” Daniel Boyarin, professor of Near Eastern studies at UC Berkeley, calls the book “accurate, well-written, and devastatingly important.”

The argument about plagiarism, which has figured prominently in the pre-publication controversy over the book, has been relegated to an appendix. Finkelstein’s evidence has already been presented in these pages by Alexander Cockburn and debated by Dershowitz in letters exchanges with Cockburn [October 13, October 27 and December 15, 2003]; thus it can be summarized here briefly. In the Dershowitz book, twenty-two out of fifty-two quotations and endnotes in the first two chapters “match almost exactly” material quoted in Joan Peters’s From Time Immemorial–including the placement of ellipses in quotations. Beyond Chutzpah has an eleven-page chart comparing these quotations. They are virtually identical. But Dershowitz never acknowledges Peters as the source for these quotations
; instead, he cites the original sources that appear in Peters’s footnotes.

The official policy on plagiarism at Harvard, where Dershowitz teaches, is clear on this issue: “Plagiarism is passing off a source’s information, ideas, or words as your own by omitting to cite them.” Dershowitz in an e-mail made three arguments in his defense: first, for three of the quotations in question, “I have incontrovertible evidence that I was using those quotations in the 1970s in debates,” and thus “I did not originally find them in the Peters book.” Second, although he did not cite Peters for the quotations listed by Finkelstein, he did cite her as the source of “at least eight” others. As to why he failed to cite Peters for the quotations in question, Dershowitz acknowledges that he found them originally in Peters, but “I then went to the Harvard library, read them, and cited them in the original,” without indicating that he found them first in the Peters book–a citation practice that he (and some of his defenders) regards as proper.

But Finkelstein somehow obtained a copy of the uncorrected page proofs of The Case for Israel containing some devastating footnotes, which he reproduces in Beyond Chutzpah–including one that says “Holly Beth: cite sources on pp. 160, 485, 486 fns 141-145.” Holly Beth Billington is credited on Dershowitz’s acknowledgments page as one of his research assistants; the pages to which he refers her are from Peters’s book. The note doesn’t tell Holly Beth that Dershowitz is going to the Harvard library to check the original sources, nor does it tell Holly Beth that she should go to the library to check; it says she should “cite” them–copy the citations from Peters into his footnote, presumably to give readers the impression that he consulted the original source. That’s not plagiarism in the sense of failing to put in quotation marks the words of somebody else, and the Harvard administration has taken no action in response to Finkelstein’s charge. But it’s clearly dishonest for Dershowitz to have passed off another scholar’s research as his own.

The Finkelstein book was originally under contract to the New Press, and Dershowitz claims he succeeded in persuading the New Press to drop it. He told me in an e-mail that after he wrote the New Press pointing out “numerous factual inaccuracies in Finkelstein’s manuscript, New Press cancelled it’s [sic] contract with him.” New Press publisher Colin Robinson says that’s not true: “We did not cancel the agreement to publish Norman’s book and never wanted to do so.” Finkelstein said the same thing in an e-mail: “I was the one who pulled out of the contract when publication was delayed due to Dershowitz’s letters. In fact, Colin urged me to reconsider the decision and stay with New Press.”

Now, despite Dershowitz’s best efforts, UC Press is publishing the book–to the great credit of director Withey and history editor Niels Hooper. The book is appearing in August rather than June–because, according to the press statement, “editing and production took longer than we hoped.” Hooper explained that California published the book not as part of a personal feud between Finkelstein and Dershowitz but because the chapters on human rights “show what is going on in the Occupied Territories and Israel.” Dershowitz is relevant as a prominent defender of Israeli policies and practices.

Will Dershowitz now sue for libel in federal court in Boston, or in London, where the law makes it easier for libel plaintiffs to win–as his attorney at Cravath, Swaine & Moore has threatened? That would be another shameful act by a man who claims to be a defender of free speech.

3) Arundhati Roy’s speech given at the World Tribunal on Iraq last Friday in Istanbul. I attended, but unfortunately only on the opening day, so I have little to add to this speech:

http://baltimorechronicle.com/062705Roy.shtml

STATEMENT OF CONSCIENCE AT THE WORLD TRIBUNAL ON IRAQ:”The Most Cowardly War in History”by Arundhati Roy

4) Here is a caucus determined to pull US troops out of Iraq. Urge your representative / senator to join:

http://www.commondreams.org/news2005/0616-32.htm

JUNE 16, 2005 1:13
PM CONTACT:
Progressive Democrats of America
Kevin Spidel
kevin@pdamerica.org
(602) 373-6990
Rep. Waters Creates New “Out-of-Iraq CongressionalCaucus”

WASHINGTON, D.C.–Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA)has informed Progressive Democrats of America (PDA)that she and Rep. Charles Rangel, Rep. Barbara Lee,Rep. Lynn Woolsey, Rep. Xavier Becerra, Rep. JohnConyers, and Rep. John Lewis are leading a newlyformed Out of Iraq Congressional Caucus, with 41members as of today.

Rep. Waters said: “The Out of Iraq CongressionalCaucus is a newly formed effort whose sole purpose isto be the main agitators in the movement to bring ourtroops home from Iraq and Afghanistan. Our effortswill include the coordination of activities andlegislation designed to achieve our goal of returningour troops home. Through floor statements, pressconferences, TV and radio appearances and otheractions, we will provide leadership for the AmericanPublic who has been waiting too long for ourcollective voices against the war.”

“This announcement illustrates the changing tide inWashington around the issue of the Iraq Occupation,”says National Director of PDA Tim Carpenter. “Thiscaucus will allow a collective dialogue withinCongress on this issue, in which the tens of thousandsof grassroots activists within PDA will be working tosupport.”
In addition, Rep. Waters will speak at today’s 5 pmrally in Lafayette Square Park in support of Rep. JohnConyers’ (D-MI) hearings today on the Downing Streetmemo. Before the rally Rep. Waters will be attendingthe hearings. The hearings are being held from2:30-4:30 pm in Room HC-9 of the U.S. Capitol, withoverflow at the Wasserman Room at 430 S Capitol St.SE.

Current members of the caucus include:
Rep. Neil Abercrombie, Rep. Xavier Becerra, Rep.Corrine Brown, Rep. Julia Carson, Rep. DonnaChristensen, Rep. John Conyers, Rep. William Delahunt,Rep. Lloyd Doggett, Rep. Sam Farr, Rep. Chaka Fattah,Rep. Raul Grijalva, Rep. Luis Gutierrez, Rep. RushHolt, Rep. Marcy Kaptur, Rep. Carolyn Kilpatrick, Rep.Dennis Kucinich, Rep. Barbara Lee, Rep. Shelia Jackson- Lee, Rep. John Lewis, Rep. James McGovern, Rep.Carolyn Maloney, Rep. Jim Moran, Rep. GraceNapolitano, Rep. Eleanor Holmes-Norton, Rep. JohnOlver, Rep. Major Owens, Rep. Donald Payne, Rep. NickRahall, Rep. Charles Rangel, Rep. Janice Schakowsky,Rep. Bobby Scott, Rep. Jose Serrano, Rep. John Tierney

5) Scott Ritter Audio:

http://www.traprockpeace.org/scott_ritter_23june05.html

³We declared a war on terror. We declared war on those who practice terror. Are we going to declare war on ourselves?² – Scott Ritter, June 23, 2005

Greetings.

We have an exclusive talk by Scott Ritter on US war making against Iran. He gave this important address at a Traprock fundraiser on June 23rd. We encourage radio airplay, downloads for private listening and linking to the audio on the Traprock website.

Ritter covers the Downing Street Memo, US mass media complicity in wars against Iraq and Iran, and the covert and terrorist war that the US is now waging against Iran. He describes pre-conflict preparations, ³warlike advance force operations² and the CIA¹s work with the terrorist MEK organization, which is committing terrorist acts, such as bombings, in Iran.

This address follows up on Ritter¹s recent article on war with Iran. His main theme came through very clearly ­ that the US is engaging in a terrorist war of aggression against Iran. He explains how the US is doing it and that,
like the war with Iraq, it is all based on a lie. Iran¹s nuclear power program is for energy, not weapons, and the administration and media know it, he says. He makes the case that the Bush regime is doing this in order to stay in power, whatever the disastrous consequences of a war for the US and Iran.

Audio link:http://www.traprockpeace.org/scott_ritter_23june05.html

We have unedited audio of both his talk and the Q and A session. The talk is 47:09 minutes and the Q and A is longer – 1:04:57. Both are available as mp3 files for radio airplay (recorded in mono at 48 kbps) Sound quality is excellent. ­ we thank Ed Russell of activeingredients.org for handling the recording. I did the editing for sound quality. While Traprock Peace Center does not necessarily agree with all of Ritter¹s opinions, the content is complete and unabridged. A video is on the way.

For the most part, the American people are ignorant about US aggression toward Iran and have bought US propaganda. The US administration has stoked the flames of hatred many Americans have felt toward Iran. Ritter describes an ugly and tragic situation that¹s not a lot of fun to look at for Americans. But look at it they must. They can¹t later say ³I didn¹t know.²

Best wishes, Charlie Jenks

Charlie Jenks
Website Manager;
Past President
Traprock Peace Center
103A Keets Road
Deerfield, MA
01342413-773-7427 (Traprock office)
413-773-5188, ex. 2 (messages)
Fax 413-773-7507
http://www.traprockpeace.org

6) International Solidarity Movement Article. The Raphael Cohen cited at the bottom of the article was at U. of Chicago in the early 90’s:

THE ISM’S CONTROVERSIAL ACTIVISTS
By Finlo Rohrer
BBC (UK)
June 27, 2005

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4625855.stm

The trial and conviction of an Israeli soldier for the manslaughter of Tom Hurndall have highlighted the controversial work of the “human shields” of the International Solidarity Movement.

To the Western peace activists themselves, they are helping defuse the situation by using non-violent means to act as a buffer between Israelis and Palestinians…

They claim Israel allows its soldiers to shoot civilians and children, and believe they can protect these victims because the Israeli Defence Force will think twice before shooting at a group that includes Westerners.

The ISM has already lost two members – the American Rachel Corrie, killed by an Israeli bulldozer, and Tom Hurndall, shot in the head.

To the Israeli authorities, the activists of the ISM are misguided outsiders who are allowing themselves to be manipulated by Palestinian militants.

They say ISM members have met suicide bombers and helped gunmen, something the group vehemently denies. Some activists who left Israel have been prevented from returning.

A spokeswoman for the Israeli embassy in London says: “Israel has no objection to foreign nationals participating in legitimate protests as long as they take place within the law and do not endanger human lives.
“Nevertheless, over the past few months, the International Solidarity Movement has actively inflamed an already tense and volatile situation.

“The ISM is a Palestinian movement using Western activists to present itself as an international peace movement.

“The ISM’s radical anti-Israeli politics, combined with their illegal and provocative methods, stand in stark contrast to the behaviour of the other NGOs operating in the area.”

The various arms of the ISM have been in existence since soon after the beginning of the latest intifada in September 2000.

Raphael Cohen, a British organiser within the ISM, says they are acting to prevent wanton killing.

“No-one goes there in the belief that they are going to be shot,” he says.

“Our presence in itself means the army are curtailed in the level of violence they can use.

“They can’t just start firing at a crowd when they know there are foreigners in there. Palestinian lives are held very cheaply.

“The rules of engagement for soldiers in the Gaza Strip have not been made available publicly.”
He says the shooting of Tom Hurndall is a perfect illustration of the Israeli army’s disregard for life.

“We were taking part in an action to set up a tent on the edge of the civilian settlement in Rafah, on an area where there has been a lot of destruction to property, to create a buffer zone between their military positions on the border and the populated area.

“They regularly drove tanks and would fire indiscriminately on the civilian population. Several people had been injured in the same week.”

And Mr Cohen, who says he has been barred from entering Israel for “security reasons”, vows that the ISM’s work will continue.

7) Radio Niqash Posting:

I would like to inform you of the official launch of the German-Iraqi media project “niqash” – a website/radio that provides a space for Iraqi citizens to debate current political issues & aims to help strengthening the nascent Iraqi civil society.

Regards,
matthias s. klein
matthias_s_klein@yahoo.com

Iraqi-German media project *NIQASH* launched!!!

On June 11, 2005, the Iraqi-German media project *niqash* – produced by “MIC – Media In Cooperation” (formerly: Streamminister) – went online and on the air. We invite you to visit our website at www.niqash.org or listen to the *niqash radio show* that is aired every Sunday, Wednesday and Friday from 12:15 to 12:45 on Radio Dijla (Baghdad – 105.2 FM).

/What is *niqash*?/ *niqash* is a space for Iraqi citizens to exchange views on the current political process and to debate the processes that are shaping the iraqi society. Its main focus is on issues relevant to the drafting of the new Iraqi constitution.

/What does *niqash* want?/Its main goal is to facilitate a public and popular debate on the current political process in Iraq.

/What does *niqash* do?/In order to achieve its goals, *niqash* provides background information, organizes expert exchanges on current topics, and offers every visitor the possibility to participate in discussions or even create a personal web-diary (blog). A newsletter keeps registered users updated.

/What is on the *niqash* website?/The segment Background<http://www.niqash.org/content.php?contentTypeID=74> provides essential information on contemporary Iraq – the country, the society, the state -, and introduces main themes of the political debate.

In the segment Debate <http://www.niqash.org/content.php?contentTypeID=75> , representatives from within the Iraqi civil society exchange opinions and ideas about political topics of their expertise. The aim is to bring people from various backgrounds (political, ethno-religious, occupational, etc.) together and – through these “expert exchanges”, initiate public discussions on topics relevant for the Iraqi civil society that will in turn affect the parliamentary decision-making and thus shape the constitution-drafting process.

The segment Community <http://www.niqash.org/community.php> contains awide array of features that will enable the visitors to the website to actively participate in the civil society debate. In free and open discussions current topics – be they drawn from the “Debate” or started by website visitors themselves – are debated. Personal web-diaries (“b
logs”) can be created and managed. Visitors can register for the “niqash”-newsletter, and even sign up for and use “niqash mail” – our very own e-mail service provider.

*Radio Niqash <http://www.niqash.org/content.php?contentTypeID=28>* is apolitical radio magazine that does both – fostering and mapping the debates revolving around the drafting of the constitution. The show will consist of interviews with experts, politicians, journalists and citizens and reports on all controversial topics connected with the current nation-building process.

All parts of the radio show will be archived on the *niqash* website. The shows are free-to-air for any radio station or Internet platform.

—*niqash* is produced by an Arab-German-Kurdish team of “Media In Cooperation” (MIC) in Berlin & Amman. Its website is published in English, Arabic, and Kurdish.

The project is funded by the German Foreign Ministry and supported by the Friedrich-Ebert-Foundation.
—“MIC – Media In Cooperation” (formerly: Streamminister) is a non-profit non-governmental media organization that was founded in Germany in April 2004. With close connections to and associations with local NGOs in Iraq MIC implements media projects that aspire to help create a stable civil society structure in Iraq. Moreover, through drawing a constructive link between institutions of civil society and those of the state, MIC aims to enable people to form their own opinion on the political processes in Iraq and articulate them within the political institutional framework. Finally, MIC aims to enhance the knowledge and understanding of the Iraqi people of such political issues that concern them the most, like the parliamentary elections and the drafting of the new Iraqi constitution.

Targeting the Iraqi people in general, but more specifically the young generation in Iraq, MIC’s joint Iraqi-German teams have so far produced radio programs with both political and cultural foci.

Through the implementation of MIC’s projects the organization aims: 1. to develop independent and interactive media programs to be involved in the rebuilding and transformation of Iraq on all levels of Iraqi society 2. to contribute to creating independent media networks with qualified professionals 3. to strengthen investigative journalism skills within the media sector so that it becomes both – an independent part of the civil society and a support of civil society’s impact on the political process.

Previous projects include “Telephone FM” – a cultural radio program – and “Election Monitor Iraq” – a radio show & website that focused on the Iraqi elections in January 2005.

8) Extraordinary Rendition:

http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2005/06/27/alleged_cia_target_tied_to_iraq_group/

Alleged CIA target tied to Iraq groupItalian official details imam case
By Sofia Celeste and Farah Stockman,
Globe Correspondent and Globe Staff
June 27, 2005

MILAN — The radical Islamic preacher who Italian prosecutors say was abducted by CIA agents in February 2003 had been involved in preparing false passports and travel documents for radical Islamic fighters traveling to northern Iraq, according to an Italian law enforcement official involved in the case….

9) I’m not at all sure I agree with the premise that your oil dollars are better off in Venezuela than in “Saudi Arabia or the Middle East,” but I DO like the idea of supporting Chavez rather than US oil multinationals — if this information is accurate. Somehow I sense that nothing in the oil industry is ever so straightforward as this message indicates. I wouldn’t be surprised if some intern at Citgo planted the story:

Published on Monday, May 16, 2005
by CommonDreams.org

Buy Your Gas at Citgo:
Join the BUY-cott!by Jeff Cohen Looking for an easy way to protest Bush foreign policyweek after week? And an easy way to help alleviateglobal poverty? Buy your gasoline at Citgo stations.

And tell your friends.

Of the top oil producing countries in the world, onlyone is a democracy with a president who was elected ona platform of using his nation’s oil revenue tobenefit the poor. The country is Venezuela. ThePresident is Hugo Chavez. Call him “the Anti-Bush.”

Citgo is a U.S. refining and marketing firm that is awholly owned subsidiary of Venezuela’s state-owned oilcompany. Money you pay to Citgo goes primarily toVenezuela — not Saudi Arabia or the Middle East.There are 14,000 Citgo gas stations in the US. (Clickherehttp://www.citgo.com/CITGOLocator/StoreLocator.jsp tofind one near you.) By buying your gasoline at Citgo,you are contributing to the billions of dollars thatVenezuela’s democratic government is using to providehealth care, literacy and education, and subsidizedfood for the majority of Venezuelans.

Instead of using government to help the rich and thecorporate, as Bush does, Chavez is using the resourcesand oil revenue of his government to help the poor inVenezuela. A country with so much oil wealth shouldn’thave 60 percent of its people living in poverty,earning less than $2 per day. With a mass movementbehind him, Chavez is confronting poverty inVenezuela. That’s why large majorities haveconsistently backed him in democratic elections. Andwhy the Bush administration supported an attemptedmilitary coup in 2002 that sought to overthrow Chavez.

So this is the opposite of a boycott. Call it aBUYcott. Spread the word.

Of course, if you can take mass transit or bike orwalk to your job, you should do so. And we should allwork for political changes that move our countrytoward a cleaner environment based on renewableenergy. The BUYcott is for those of us who don’t havea practical alternative to filling up our cars.

So get your gas at Citgo. And help fuel a democraticrevolution in Venezuela.

Jeff Cohen is an author and media critic(www.jeffcohen.org)

11) Oil and Iraq Connection:

http://www.bluegreenearth.us/archive/article/2005/culture-change/lundberg-special1-2005.html

From an article by oil former analyst Jan Lundberg,cited in Congressman Roscoe Bartlett’s (R.) recent testimony to the House on peak oil: “The viciousnessof the invasion of Iraq… should serve to wake peopleup to wean themselves off petroleum.” The connectionis fundamental, no one needs convincing–yet for somereason it continues & continues not being made. I’msorry the Tribunal was one more a venue that couldhave but didn’t–even as a sidebar–look at the largercontext of the war and, in consideration of saidcontext, a more ecological/ holistic (rather thannarrowly political) consideration of “guilt.”

12) Green technology isn’t always very green

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/andrewkantor/2005-06-24-green-tech_x.htm?csp=22_elp

If I see one more article about how wonderfulalternative energy is compared to oil, I’m gonna flip. Alternative energy sources can be good —very good in fact. And it’s pretty obvious that we’regoing to need them, and that our dependence on oil (foreign or otherwise) is a Bad Thing.

But accepting that does not mean accepting that anykind of alternative energy is by default a good thing.
To be a good thing, it has to have three properties:1) It has to help reduce our dependence on oil, 2) It has to be no worse for the environment, and 3) It has to be economically practical.

Many of the things touted meet one or even two ofthose criteria. Solar panels, for example. They can reduce our need for oil, at least in certainregions, and they’re certainly not bad for theenvironment. But they’re prohibitively expensive. If you spend the money to make your homesolar-powered, you probably won’t recoup your costsfor at least 15 years, which approaches the lifespan of the panels.

I realize that these days, taking a moderate positionon anything makes you the enemy of everyone who has an extreme view. But green isn’t always good, and oil isn’t always bad.

Certainly we need to clean up our act big time andfind viable sources of alternative energy. Depending on the Saudis — and oil — for our energy needs is stupid.

But we also have to keep in mind that every one ofthese alternative-energy sources comes at a cost, which is something people seem to forget. Theyhear the phrase “alternative energy” and automaticallyassume it’s got to be good.

And this makes them no better than the people who hearit and think it’s a waste of time.

It’s not easy being green

Two seemingly “green” technologies that pop up againand again are ethanol and electric cars. Both are touted by well-meaning people as good for theenvironment and a way to reduce our oil dependence,especially as oil prices continue to rise.

I’ve written in detail about ethanol before, but itdeserves a rehash. The Senate, you see, is considering a bill that would require a doubling of the amount of ethanol mixed with gasoline at the pump.

They say it’s about oil dependence and theenvironment, but it’s not. It’s about buying votes from farmers by artificially creating demand for crops— ethanol coming, in large part, from corn.

But there are a bunch of problems with ethanol. First,it doesn’t have as much energy as gasoline, which means it takes about 1.5 gallons of ethanol to get you as far as one gallon of gas.

Ethanol also requires a lot to produce it — 26 poundsof corn to get a gallon, in fact. And growing corn requires lots of water and fertilizer and pesticide, not to mention the energy required to distill it into ethanol.
And by-products of that distillation include(according to the EPA) acetic acid, carbon monoxide, formaldehyde, and methanol, all of which are pumpedinto the air. Yum.

It boils down to this: Ethanol sounds good, but theenergy required to produce it, and the pollutants it generates, mean it’s arguably worse for the environment than gasoline, especially consideringthe cleanliness of today’s engines.

On the other hand, even with the acreage, water,fertilizer, and pesticide, ethanol has one big thing going for it: It’s not produced by the Saudis.

It’s electric

Hearing the un-researched praises heaped on ethanolsets my teeth on edge, but hearing the supposed ecological wonders of electric cars makes me wantto bang my head against the desk. (I’m talking abouttrue electric vehicles, not hybrids.)

Electric cars are dirty. In fact, not only are theydirty, they might even be more dirty than their gasoline-powered cousins. People in California love to talk about “zero-emissions vehicles,” butpeople in California seem to be clueless about whereelectricity comes from. How else can you explain a state that uses more and more of it while not allowing new power plants to be built?

Quoth Schoolhouse Rock: “Power plants most all usefire to make it: electricity, electricity/Burnin’ fuel and usin’ steam, they generate electricity — electricity.”

Aside from the few folks who have their roofs coveredwith solar cells, we get our electricity from generators. Generators are fueled by something —usually a hydrocarbon (coal, oil, diesel) but also byheat generated in nuclear power plants. (There are a few wind farms and geothermal plants as well, but by far we get electricity by burning something.)

In other words, those “zero-emissions” cars are likelycoal-burning cars. It’s just the coal is burned somewhere else so it looks clean.

It isn’t. It’s as if the California Greens arecovering their eyes — “If I can’t see it, it’s not happening.”
But it’s worse than that. Gasoline is an incrediblyefficient way to power a vehicle; a gallon of gas has a lot of energy in it. But when you take that gas (or another fuel) and first use it to make electricity, you waste a nice chunk of that energy, mostly in the form of wasted heat — at the generator, through the transmission lines, etc.

In other words, a gallon of gas may propel your car 25miles. But the electricity you get from that gallon of gas won’t get you nearly as far — so electric cars burn more fuel than gas-powered ones. If our electricity came mostly from nukes, or geothermal, or hydro, or solar, or wind, then an electric car truly would be clean. But for political, technical, and economic reasons, we don’t use much of thoseenergy sources. We should, but we don’t — that meansthose electric cars have a dirty past.

Furthermore, today’s cars are very, very clean. I’d bewilling to bet they’re a lot cleaner than coal-burning power plants. And that’s not evengetting into whatever toxic niceties are in thoseelectric cars’ batteries — stuff that will eventually end up in a landfill. And finally, when cars are the polluters, the pollution is spread across all the roads. When it’s a power plant, though, all the junk is in one place. Nature is very good at cleaning up when things are not too concentrated, but it takes a lot longer when all the garbage is in one spot.
Being green is good. We’ve squandered our spaceprogram on things like the International Space Money Pit, so we won’t be leaving the planet very soon. It’s what we’ve got and we should do better at takingcare of it.
But that doesn’t mean we should jump on any technologylabeled “green” anymore than investors should have jumped on any stock labeled “tech” in the 1990s. We know what happened there.

1) This weekend I'll be attending the World Tribunal
in Istanbul.  Check out the schedule here:
www.worldtribunal.org .  Featuring Arundhati Roy,
Dennis Halliday, and several others, it should be
quite an event:

"US Television Network to Provide Global Broadcast of
World Tribunal on Iraq. Marks Third Anniversary of
Invasion of Iraq. June 24-27, 2005 from Istanbul
Turkey," in Common Dreams Progressive Newswire,
online, June 20, 2005: "The final session of the WTI
in Istanbul is the culmination of two years of
rigorous investigation documenting violations of
international law and human rights by the United
States and its allies leading up to and during the
invasion of Iraq and in the continuing occupation."
"The expert opinion, witness testimony, video and
image evidence will address: ... The destruction of
Iraqi cultural institutions and the liability of the
invaders in international law for failing to protect
these treasures of humanity. WTI witnesses and jurors
will include: ... Iraqi museum founder and curator
Amal Al Khedairy; ... A complete listing of sessions
and speakers, along with additional background
information on The World Tribunal on Iraq can be found
at www.deepdishtv.org."


2) The article is exceedingly mysterious.  Did the
Iranians manage to shoot down a U-2 plane in their
airspace, requiring a rescue and recovery op from
CentCom's special forces detail?  That would explain
the "South-West Asia" location, as well as the "host
nation sensitivities" (i.e. of UAE hosting a US
airbase with planes that are routinely violating
Iranian airspace for the purposes of spying and
espionage [like for an impending bunker buster nuclear
facility strike, which we're all awaiting this
summer], which could be interpreted as a causus belli
on Iran's part).  All speculation, but when articles
like this surface, one is obliged to speculate:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1512521,00.html

U-2 spy plane crash kills pilot

Jamie Wilson in Washington
Thursday June 23, 2005
The Guardian

The pilot of a US air force U-2 spy plane was killed
in a crash while returning to base, the US military
confirmed yesterday.

The aircraft had been carrying out a mission in
support of operations in Afghanistan, a Pentagon
spokesman said. Officials refused to say where the
plane came down because of what were described as
"host nation sensitivities".

The cause of the crash is not known, but officials
said there were no indications of hostile fire.

A spokesman for US central command would only specify
"south-west Asia", which can be used as a substitute
for the Middle East. American U-2s operate from an
airbase in the United Arab Emirates, although US
military officials refuse to discuss this fact at the
UAE's request because it is sensitive about US forces
being deployed on its territory.
"The crash happened at approximately 11.30pm [GMT]
Tuesday," the spokesman said.

"The pilot has been confirmed dead. The cause of the
crash is unknown at this time. An investigation board
has been set up and will determine its cause." He said
the plane had completed a mission in support of
Operation Enduring Freedom, the title given to the war
in Afghanistan, when it crashed. "The site of the
crash has been secured to ensure the safety of local
citizens and the integrity of the site for
investigation team members," the spokesman added.

Once a closely held secret, the U-2, which operates at
an altitude of more than 70,000 feet (about 21,000
metres), beyond the range of most surface to air
missiles, has been in service for decades.

The most famous downing of a U-2 spy plane was on May
1 1960 over Soviet territory. The aircraft was
photographing Soviet missile installations, and after
parachuting to safety, the pilot, Gary Powers, was
captured and later convicted as a spy. He was held for
almost two years before being traded for a KGB man
held in the west.

Other U-2 spy planes were later shot down, including
one over Cuba during the missile crisis in 1962.

As of yesterday 194 US servicemen and women have been
killed in Operation Enduring Freedom.



2) Evangelicals in Iraq:

Evangelicals Building a Base in Iraq
Newcomers Raise Worry Among Traditional Church Leaders

By Caryle Murphy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 23, 2005; A01

BAGHDAD -- With arms outstretched, the congregation at
National Evangelical Baptist Church belted out a
praise hymn backed up by drums, electric guitar and
keyboard. In the corner, slide images of Jesus filled
a large screen. A simple white cross of wood adorned
the stage, and worshipers sprinkled the pastor's
Bible-based sermon with approving shouts of "Ameen!"

National is Iraq's first Baptist congregation and one
of at least seven new Christian evangelical churches
established in Baghdad in the past two years. Its
Sunday afternoon service, in a building behind a house
on a quiet street, draws a couple of hundred
worshipers who like the lively music and focus on the
Bible.

"I'm thirsty for this kind of church," Suhaila Tawfik,
a veterinarian who was raised Catholic, said at a
recent service. "I want to go deep in understanding
the Bible."

Tawfik is not alone. The U.S.-led toppling of Saddam
Hussein, who limited the establishment of new
denominations, has altered the religious landscape of
predominantly Muslim Iraq. A newly energized Christian
evangelical activism here, supported by Western and
other foreign evangelicals, is now challenging the
dominance of Iraq's long-established Christian
denominations and drawing complaints from Muslim and
Christian religious leaders about a threat to the
status quo.

The evangelicals' numbers are not large -- perhaps a
few thousand -- in the context of Iraq's estimated
800,000 Christians. But they are emerging at a time
when the country's traditional churches have lost
their privileged Hussein-era status and have
experienced massive depletions of their flocks because
of decades-long emigration. Now, traditional church
leaders see the new evangelical churches filling up,
not so much with Muslim converts but with Christians
like Tawfik seeking a new kind of worship experience.

"The way the preachers arrived here . . . with
soldiers . . . was not a good thing," said Baghdad's
Roman Catholic archbishop, Jean Sleiman. "I think they
had the intention that they could convert Muslims,
though Christians didn't do it here for 2,000 years."

"In the end," Sleiman said, "they are seducing
Christians from other churches."

Iraq's new churches are part of Christian
evangelicalism's growing presence in several Middle
Eastern countries, experts say. In neighboring Jordan,
for example, "the indigenous evangelical presence is
growing and thriving," said Todd M. Johnson, a scholar
of global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological
Seminary in Massachusetts.

Nabeeh Abbassi, president of the Jordan Baptist
Convention, said in an interview in Amman that there
are about 10,000 evangelicals worshiping at 50
churches in Jordan. They include 20 Ba
ptist churches
with a combined regular Sunday attendance of 5,000, he
added. The organization also operates the Baptist
School of Amman, where 40 percent of the student body
is Muslim.

While most evangelicals in Jordan come from
traditional Christian denominations, Abbassi said,
"we're seeing more and more Muslim conversions, not
less than 500 a year" over the past 10 years.

Iraq's Christian population has been organized for
centuries into denominations such as Chaldean
Catholicism and Roman Catholicism. While Hussein's
secular regime allowed freedom of worship, it limited
new denominations, particularly if backed by Western
churches.

During the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, American
evangelicals made no secret of their desire to follow
the troops. Samaritan's Purse, the global relief
organization led by the Rev. Franklin Graham -- who
has called Islam an "evil and wicked" religion -- and
the International Mission Board of the Southern
Baptist Convention, the country's largest Protestant
denomination, were among those that mobilized
missionaries and relief supplies.

Soon after Hussein's fall, they entered the country,
saying their prime task was to provide Iraqis with
humanitarian aid. But their strong emphasis on sharing
their faith raised concerns among Muslims and some
Christians that they would openly proselytize.

Then the security environment deteriorated in Iraq --
four Southern Baptist missionaries were killed,
Westerners were kidnapped and at least 21 churches
were bombed -- forcing most foreign evangelicals to
flee. But Iraqi evangelicals remain.

"For Christians, it's now democratic," said Nabil A.
Sara, 60, the pastor at National Evangelical Baptist.
"It's not like before. There is freedom now. Nobody
can say, 'Why do you start a new church?' "

Some church leaders, however, are asking that very
question.

"Evangelicals come here and I would like to ask: Why
do you come here? For what reason?" said Patriarch
Emmanuel Delly, head of the Eastern rite Chaldean
Catholic Church, Iraq's largest Christian community.

In interviews, Delly and Sleiman were torn between
their belief in religious freedom and the threat they
see from the new evangelicalism. They also expressed
anger and resentment at what they perceive as the
evangelicals' assumption that members of old-line
denominations are not true Christians.

"If we are not Christians, you should tell us so we
will find the right path," Delly said sarcastically.
"I'm not against the evangelicals. If they go to an
atheist country to promote Christ, we would help them
ourselves."

Sleiman charged that the new churches were sowing "a
new division" among Christians because "churches here
mean a big community with tradition, language and
culture, not simply a building with some people
worshiping. If you want to help Christians here, help
through the churches [already] here."

Still, the Roman Catholic prelate said he could not
oppose the evangelicals because "we ask for freedom of
conscience." He also said he respected how they appear
"ready to die" for their beliefs. "Sometimes I'm
telling myself they are more zealous than me, and we
can profit from this positive dimension of their
mission."

Some Iraqi Christians expressed fear that the
evangelicals would undermine Christian-Muslim harmony
here, which rests on a long-standing, tacit agreement
not to proselytize each other. "There is an informal
agreement that says we have nothing to do with your
religion and faith," said Yonadam Kanna, one of six
Christians elected to Iraq's parliament. "We are
brothers but we don't interfere in your religion."

Delly said that "even if a Muslim comes to me and
said, 'I want to be Christian,' I would not accept. I
would tell him to go back and try to be a good Muslim
and God will accept you." Trying to convert Muslims to
Christianity, he added, "is not acceptable."

Sheik Fatih Kashif Ghitaa, a prominent Shiite Muslim
leader in Baghdad, was among those who expressed alarm
at the postwar influx of foreign missionaries. In a
recent interview, he said he feared that Muslims
misunderstand why many Christians talk about their
faith.

"They have to talk about Jesus and what Jesus has
done. This is one of the principles of believing in
Christianity," said Ghitaa. "But the problem is that
the others don't understand it, they think these
people are coming to convert them."

Robert Fetherlin, vice president for international
ministries at Colorado-based Christian and Missionary
Alliance, which supports one of the new Baghdad
evangelical churches, defended his denomination's
overseas work.

"We're not trying to coerce people to follow Christ,"
he said. "But we want to at least communicate to
people who He is. We feel very encouraged by the
possibility for people in Iraq to have the freedom to
make choices about what belief system they want to buy
into."

Sara said that if Muslims approach him with "questions
about Jesus and about the Bible," he responds. But the
white-haired pastor said there was plenty of
evangelizing to be done among Christians because, in
his view, many do not really know Jesus. "They know
[Him] just in name," he said, adding that they need a
better understanding of "why He died for them."

His church appeals to dissatisfied Christians, he
said, adding, "If you go to a Catholic church, for
example, there is no Bible in the church, there is no
preaching, and just a little singing."

National congregant Zeena Woodman, 30, who was raised
in the Syrian Orthodox Church, agreed. "Praising Jesus
Christ in this church is not as traditional as other
churches," she said. "It's much more interesting
here."

Sara, a former Presbyterian who started an underground
evangelical church in his home after having a
born-again experience, began working openly during the
U.S. occupation. In January 2004, he was ordained
pastor of his church in a ceremony attended by more
than 20 Baptist pastors and deacons from Iraq, Jordan,
Lebanon and the United States. Baptist communities in
these countries financially support National
Evangelical, Sara said.

The church's name and a white cross are visible from
the street. The pastor said that no one has threatened
the church and that it has good relations with its
Muslim neighbors.

In fact, said Sara, "Muslims across the street came
and asked us to pray for their mother."

Special correspondent Bassam Sebti contributed to this
report.



4) Blumenthal op-ed.  Note that Bush's approval
ratings are now down to 39%, which is lower than
Clinton ever reached.  If he hits the 20's, they say
that's when it gets hard to govern:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1512412,00.html

Blinded by the light at the end of the tunnel

The American public is increasingly disillusioned by
the Iraq war, and Bush's triumphalism only makes
things worse

Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday June 23, 2005
The Guardian

On June 21, network news reported that the Pentagon
had claimed that 47 enemy operatives had been killed
in Operation Spear in western Iraq. Last month, the
Pentagon declared 125 had been killed in Operation
Matador, near the Syrian border. "We don't do body
counts on
other people," Donald Rumsfeld, the
secretary of defence, stated in November 2003.
On January 29 this year, the day before the Iraqi
election, President Bush announced that it was the
"turning point". On May 2 2003, he stood on the deck
of the USS Abraham Lincoln behind a banner saying
"Mission Accomplished" and the next day proclaimed
that the "mission is completed". On June 2 this year,
he declared: "Our mission is clear there, as well, and
that is to train the Iraqis so they can do the
fighting."

Last week, Bush retreated to his ultimate
justification, that Iraq was invaded because Saddam
Hussein was involved with the terrorists behind the
September 11 attacks, a notion believed by a majority
of those who voted for him in 2004: "We went to war
because we were attacked ..."

On March 16 2003, Dick Cheney, the vice-president,
prophesied: "We will, in fact, be greeted as
liberators ... I think it will go relatively quickly."
Only last month Cheney assured us that the insurgency
in Iraq is in "the last throes". On June 18, General
William Webster, the US commander in Baghdad, said:
"Certainly saying anything about 'breaking the back'
or 'about to reach the end of the line' or those kinds
of things do not apply to the insurgency at this
point."

The war has reached a tipping point - not in Iraq, but
in the US. Every announcement of a "turning point"
heightens the rising tide of public disillusionment.
Every reference to September 11 strains the
administration's credibility. Every revelation of how
"the intelligence and facts were being fixed around
the policy" for war, as in the Downing Street memo,
shatters even Republicans' previously implacable
faith.

On June 21, a Gallup poll reported that Bush's
approval rating was collapsing along with support for
the war. Only 39% of Americans support it. "The
decline in support for the war is found among
Republicans and independents, with little change among
Democrats." (Since March, Republican support has
fallen 11 points to 70%.).......



5) CSM on DSM:

Downing Street Memos: What the 'Downing Street'
memos show, according to a Christian Science Monitor
analysis:

Interpretations vary, but British documents provide
rare insight into the lead-up to war.

http://search.csmonitor.com/search_content/0621/p03s01-usfp.html



6) GRADUATE SCHOOL BARBIE (humor):

This year's new toy: GRADUATE SCHOOL BARBIE (TM)

Graduate School Barbie comes in two forms: 1)
Delusional Master's Barbie (tm) and 2) Ph.D. Masochist
Barbie (tm).

Every Graduate School Barbie comes with these
fun-filled features guaranteed to delight and
entertain for hours:

Grad School Barbie comes out of the box with a big
grin on her face that turns into a frown after 2 weeks
or her first advisor meeting (whichever comes first).
And adorable black circles under her delightfully
bloodshot eyes.

She comes with two outfits: a grubby pair of blue
jeans and 5 year-old Old Navy T-shirt, and a floppy
pair of gray sweatpants with a matching "Go Screw
Yourself" T-shirt.

Grad School Barbie talks! Just press the button on her
left hand and hear her say such upbeat grad school
phrases like, "Yes, Professor, it'll be done by
tomorrow," "I'd love to write it all over again," and
"Why didn't I just get a job, I could have been making
$50,000 a year by now if I had just started working
with a Bachelor's.  But noooooo...I had to further my
degree.  I wish somebody would drop a bomb on the
school so that I'd have an excuse to stop working on
my degree that's sucking every last drop of life force
out of my withered and degraded excuse for a soul..."
(9 V lithium batteries sold separately).

Grad School Barbie is anatomically correct to teach
kids about the exciting changes that come with
pursuing a higher education. Removable panels on
Barbie's head and torso allow you to watch as her
cerebellum fries to a crispy brown, her heart races
150 beats per minute, and her stomach lining gradually
dissolve into nothing. Deluxe Barbie comes with
specially designed eye ducts. Just add a little water,
and watch Grad School Barbie burst into tears at
random intervals. Fun for the whole family!

Other accessories include: Grad School Barbie's Fun
Fridge (tm) Well stocked with microwave popcorn,
Coca-Cola, Healthy Choice Bologna (99% fat free!), and
small bottle of Mattel Brand Rum (tm). Grad School
Barbie's Medicine Cabinet comes in fabulous pink and
contains Barbie sized bottles of Advil, St. Johns
Wort, Zantac, and your choice of three fun
anti-anxiety drugs! (Barbie Medicine Cabinet not
available without a prescription). Grad School
Barbie's Computer Workstation comes with miniature
obsolete PC (pink of course), rickety desk, and over a
dozen miniature Mountain Dew cans to decorate your
workstation with (Mountain Dew deposit not included in
price, tech support sold separately)

And Grad School Barbie is not alone! Order now and
you'll get two of Barbie's great friends! GRADUATE
ADVISOR KEN: Barbie's mentor and advisor in her quest
for increased education and decreased self-esteem.
Grad Advisor Ken (tm) comes with a supply of red pens
and a permanent frown. Press the button to hear Grad
Advisor Ken deliver such wisdom to Barbie as "I need
an update on your progress," "I don't think you'll be
ready to graduate yet," and "This is nowhere near
ready for publication." Buy 3 or more dolls, and you
can have Barbie's Thesis Committee! (Palm Pilot and
tenure sold separately.)

REAL JOB SKIPPER: When Barbie needs to talk, she knows
that she can always count on her good friend Real Job
Skipper (tm), who got a job after getting her bachelor
degree.  Press the button to hear Real Job Skipper
say, "Sometimes I wish I went for a graduate degree,"
and "Work is so hard, I had to work a half an hour of
overtime!"  Real Job Skipper's Work Wardrobe and
Savings account sold separately. WARNING: Do not place
Grad Student Barbie and Real Job Skipper too close to
each other, as there have been several mysterious
cases of children leaving the room and coming back to
find Barbie's hands mysteriously fused to Skipper's
throat.


Laura Kozek



7) German opinions on Bush:

http://www.indybay.org/news/2005/03/1728717.php

1) Kurdistan Hath Arrived:

INSIGHT IRAQ Volume I, Issue 7

June 9, 2005

Comment From Iraq

Control In Northern Iraq

A colleague recently crossing into northern Iraq from
Turkey reports an interesting form of passport control
on the Iraqi side. The receiving Kurdish
militiamen glue a detachable pageinto the incoming
traveler's passport. On the paper, one finds a visa,
granting entry into theRepublic of Kurdistan/Region of
Iraq..

When our colleague left northern Iraq a week or so
later, another visa.. this one an exit permit..
was attached to the same piece of paper. Just before
crossing the frontier, the Kurds removed the original,
now much-stamped piece of paper from his passport.
They handed it to a Kurdish customs official before
our colleague then reentered Turkey with his passport
showing no overt sign of either entry into Iraq or
into the selfstyled Republic of Kurdistan.

Our same friend reported seeing the name of the
Republic of Kurdistan/Region of Iraq in another place,
this time in Production Sharing Agreements offered to
various international parties. Within the PSAs, the
reader found an extensive quotation from U. S. State
Department opinion going back to 17 September 1998,
the essence of which appeared to state that the U. S.
government regards the Kurdish authority in northern
Iraq as having supreme domain over natural resources
in that area, at least since the first Gulf War of
1991.

Larry Meyers, Editor

Insight Iraq

To unsubscribe or comment, please reply to this
e-mail.

Copyright 2005



2) This is a fairly dark assessment of kidnappings,
torture, and domestic rendition as occuring in the
aforemention Kurdistan:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/14/AR2005061401828.html


Kurdish Officials Sanction Abductions in Kirkuk
U.S. Memo Says Arabs, Turkmens Secretly Sent to the
North

By Steve Fainaru and Anthony Shadid
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, June 15, 2005; Page A01

KIRKUK, Iraq -- Police and security units, forces led
by Kurdish political parties and backed by the U.S.
military, have abducted hundreds of minority Arabs and
Turkmens in this intensely volatile city and spirited
them to prisons in Kurdish-held northern Iraq,
according to U.S. and Iraqi officials, government
documents and families of the victims.

Seized off the streets of Kirkuk or in joint
U.S.-Iraqi raids, the men have been transferred
secretly and in violation of Iraqi law to prisons in
the Kurdish cities of Irbil and Sulaymaniyah,
sometimes with the knowledge of U.S. forces. The
detainees, including merchants, members of tribal
families and soldiers, have often remained missing for
months; some have been tortured, according to released
prisoners and the Kirkuk police chief.

A confidential State Department cable, obtained by The
Washington Post and addressed to the White House,
Pentagon and U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, said the
"extra-judicial detentions" were part of a "concerted
and widespread initiative" by Kurdish political
parties "to exercise authority in Kirkuk in an
increasingly provocative manner."....


3) California uber alles:

http://ihsan-net.blogspot.com/2005/06/lodi-california.html#label

Sunday, June 12, 2005
Lodi, California
Salaam Alaikum!

By now just about everyone reading this blog (at least
in the United States) is probably familiar with Lodi,
California - a small town in what is known as Central
Valley. After the initial arrest of five individuals,
the town's Muslim population continues to be harassed
by the FBI.

Following is the experience of Mr. James Schwab of the
ACLU, and Director of Associate Students of the
University of California at Davis Office of External
Affairs. Mr. Schwab visited Lodi this past Friday
evening:

Last night, Norb, Dean, and I headed down to Lodi, a
recent hotspot in the "War on Terror". We went simply
as a citizen, a lawyer, and a student.

On our long drive down a slow moving I-99 we kept in
contact with our friend Basim Elkarra (Executive
Director, CAIR, Sacramento). He was being pulled in
many directions as he tried to calm the fears of a
frightened community, keep track of who was being
quesionted by the FBI, and teach the community there
rights. He needed help.

When we arrived in Lodi we met Bashim at a local
motel, a few blocks from "ground zero". Inside the
room was Bashim and several, local, young males. They
had been helping our friend with translation and
outreach in the community.

As soon as we walked in, we were delegated different
duties. Norb and I would stay and interview locals
either with notes or a video camera. Dean would go
with Bashim to the mosque so he could give a quick
civil rights training and assure the community that
help is on the way.

Bashim told me after the training, that he will never
forget the look of relief and happiness on people's
faces as Dean gave his presentation.

As for Norb and I, the first young lady we interviewed
was related to, and lived in the same house as, the
two gentleman originally arrested. She was visibly
shaking as she told us the story of what happened this
past Tuesday, three days after the original arrests.

The FBI had been closley watching the house even after
the arrests, so they knew that only 3 women and 5
children were inside. On Tuesday they decided to
execute a search warrant by ramming down the front
door and secruing the house with dozens of well-armed
agents. Guns were put to the women's heads. One passed
out.

An ambulance was called to help her. When it arrived
the agents would not let the EMT in. Only after the
EMT refused to leave was he allowed in, but she was
not allowed to be taken to the hospital.

There were no arrests just the seizure of tax and
banking information. The next two young men were both
working at a local packing plant when about 10 agents
arrived.

In front of their co-workers they were both padded
down and frisked. They were told that they had to come
with the agents to answer a few questions, the young
men complied. They took them in separate cars, one to
his home for the interview, the other to the Lodi
Police station. The one who was taken home, was
interrogated for an hour about what he had done in
Pakistan 4 years prior when he was 16.

After the questioning was done, the agent gave him his
card and told him he would have to come up to
Sacrmento for further questioning later in the week.

The other young man refused to be interviewed at home,
so as to not upset his parents, thus he was taken to
the local police station (where they have conducted a
lot of the interviews). He went through a similar line
of questioning about his activities in Pakistan 8
years prior when he was 10. During the interview they
tried to make him admit to knowing and training with
Al-Queda.

After several other similar interviews, Dean and
Bashim returned. We began to stratgize about the rest
of the evening. Norb stepped outside for some fresh
air. With in a f
ew minutes, I received a call from
Norb that "they had arrived". "They" were the FBI who
had parked two unmarked vehicles to the north and
south of our hotel room. Three other unmarked vehicle
had circled several times as well.

Our plan for the evening was to check out the local
mosque, where more FBI agents were staked out and to
meet up with two gentlemen who were wanted by the FBI
for questioning. We had talked them and told them not
to go and to wait for us.

As we left the room we could not help but take out our
video camera. We walked right up to one of the FBI
cars and taped him talking on his cell, he pretended
we were not there. We then climbed into our vehicle
and left for the mosque. Pulling out of the parking
lot, we were followed by the two vehicles watching our
room. Turning down the street on which the mosque
sits, three other vehicles joined them. The camera is
rolling this whole time.

We arrive at the mosque and park. Bashim and two
locals go inside for prayer and to find the two wanted
gentlemen. Norb, Dean and I walk across the street to
a park where we were told the FBI hangs out. The five
vehicle that had followed us there were now constantly
circling the block, briefly pulling over and then
pulling away again. In the sky were two small single
engine airplanes, which the local said had been up
there on and off for the past 6 days. While the five
veichle were circling we noticed about three more
sitting in the parking lot of the park.

Bashim returned and informed us the two men were not
at the mosque and that we should go to their family's
house. We climbed back into the van and begin to drive
over, the FBI in close behind. On the way over I
talked with Bashim about how to mobilize the
community. I had thought that if only we could get all
the community leaders together...all the community
leaders are currently sitting in jail. The FBI had
taken the heart out of this community.

We arrived at the family's house and sat down to talk
with 6 older gentlemen, relatives of the two men we
were looking for. The relatives informed us that the
two men had gone to the police station to meet with
the FBI. We quickly got them to take Dean on as their
attorney, pro bono of course, so we could try to get
these men out.

We rushed over to the police station, but this time
there was no FBI to be seen. It was about 10pm and the
station was locked up, so we buzzed the front desk. We
asked the dispatcher if the two young men were in
there. She said no. We told her that we had been
informed they had come down here, and
in fact there car was parked out front. She said there
is no one here being questioned by the FBI. We then
called the Special Agent who had been giving his card
out all over town. He told us that they were inside
the Lodi police station.

Again we buzzed the dispatcher and again she said
there was no one there. We were about to get back into
the car, when a Lodi police officer came out a side
entrance and told us that yes the two men were inside
and that we would be let in. Unfortunately, the FBI
would not Dean to see the men as they had not
requested to see a lawyer. At about 12:30am one of the
men comes down, very surprised to see us.

As it turns out he was not being interrorgated, he had
simply come with his relative who was being
questioned. About a half hour later, after being
interrogated for six hours and put under several lie
detector tests, the man was released.

After a quick debriefing with the two gentlemen the
locals went home and so did we. Everyday dozens of
people are being questioned, harassed, and followed.
They need our help.

James Schwab

Director
Associate Students of the University of California at
Davis
Office of External Affairs




4) President for life?  I wouldn't have believed such
an internet posting not 3-4 years back, but now I'm
willing to at least give it a hear.  That said, the
Congressional link given in the article does work, so
it does appear to have been proposed:

The 22nd Amendment

Section 1. No person shall be elected to the office of
the President more than twice, and no person who has
held the office of President, or acted as President,
for more than two years of a term to which some other
person was elected President shall be elected to the
office of the President more than once. But this
Article shall not apply to any person holding the
office of President when this Article was proposed by
the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may
be holding the office of President, or acting as
President, during the term within which this Article
becomes operative from holding the office of President
or acting as President during the remainder of such
term.

Section. 2. This article shall be inoperative unless
it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the
Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of
the several States within seven years from the date of
its submission to the States by the Congress.

Ratification was completed on February 27, 1951.

-http://prisonplanet.com/articles/june2005/140605presidentforlife.htm

New Bill Could Make Bush President For Life
Prison Planet | June 14 2005

A House bill has been introduced that would change
the 22nd amendment and enable George Bush to remain
President for the rest of his political life.

The bill would repeal limitations on a President
holding office for a maximum of two terms.

This is the modern day version of the Enabling Act,
which allowed Hitler to officially declare himself
dictator.

The bill, which can be found at the Library of
Congress website here, reads as follows.

Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the
United States to repeal the 22nd amendment to the
Constitution. (Introduced in House)

HJ 24 IH
109th CONGRESS
1st Session

H. J. RES. 24
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the
United States to repeal the 22nd amendment to the
Constitution.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

February 17, 2005

Mr. HOYER (for himself, Mr. BERMAN, Mr. SENSENBRENNER,
Mr. SABO, and Mr. PALLONE) introduced the following
joint resolution; which was referred to the Committee
on the Judiciary


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



JOINT RESOLUTION
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the
United States to repeal the 22nd amendment to the
Constitution.

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled
(two-thirds of each House concurring therein), That
the following article is proposed as an amendment to
the Constitution of the United States, which shall be
valid to all intents and purposes as part of the
Constitution when ratified by the legislatures of
three-fourths of the several States within seven years
after the date of its submission for ratification:

`Article --

`The twenty-second article of amendment to the
Constitution of the United States is repealed.'.

------------------------------

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.J.RES.24.IH:



5) Another peak oil article -- hmmm, maybe it's
actually true that
 the party's going to be over within
a decade:

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,9115,1506700,00.html

Casualties of the oil stampede

Those behind human rights abuses and an alleged safety
cover-up around the Caspian pipeline must be held to
account

Michael Meacher
Wednesday June 15, 2005
The Guardian

A huge new oil pipeline, opened a week ago but not
fully operational till August, is set to become an
environmental, political and economic timebomb. Over
1,000 miles long, it is a classic example of
pretensions to corporate social responsibility claimed
by the BP consortium being trampled all over by the
stampede for oil.

The new Great Game is the competition for control of
the world's few remaining big oilfields. Global oil
production will probably peak in 2010-15, and for the
last 40 years new annual discoveries of oil have been
far short of the increase in annual demand. The end of
Big Oil is in sight, and with it the oil-powered
civilisation we've all grown accustomed to. The
struggle to dominate remaining supplies is intense,
nowhere more so than in the Caspian basin, with
probably the largest remaining oil deposits after the
Middle East.

Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, bordering the Caspian,
together hold oil reserves three times the size of
America's. The route most favoured by the west to
transport the oil out of the Caspian goes from Baku in
Azerbaijan via Tbilisi in Georgia to the Mediterranean
port of Ceyhan in Turkey. This BTC project costs
around £2.4bn, with BP leading a consortium of 11
companies. Almost three-quarters of the funding comes
from bank loans, with public bodies such as the World
Bank providing £350m, including £56m from the British
Export Credits Guarantee Department....



6) NPR/PBS Move-On Petition:

Hi,

You know that email petition that keeps circulating
about how Congress is slashing funding for NPR and
PBS? Well, now it's actually true. (Really. Check at
the bottom if you don't believe me.)

Sign the petition telling Congress to save NPR and
PBS:

http://www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting/?t=2

A House panel has voted to eliminate all public
funding for NPR and PBS, starting with "Sesame
Street," "Reading Rainbow," and other commercial-free
children's shows. If approved, this would be the most
severe cut in the history of public broadcasting,
threatening to pull the plug on Big Bird, Cookie
Monster, and Oscar the Grouch.

The cuts would slash 25% of the federal funding this
year—$100 million—and end funding altogether within
two years. The loss could kill beloved children's
shows like "Clifford the Big Red Dog," "Arthur," and
"Postcards from Buster." Rural stations and those
serving low-income communities might not survive.
Other stations would have to increase corporate
sponsorships.

The next vote on the cuts will take place tomorrow
(Thursday). Help us reach 400,000 signatures to be
delivered to the committee members.

http://www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting/?t=3

Thanks!

P.S. Read the Washington Post report on the threat to
NPR and PBS at:

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=745


7) True Majority petition, regarding Downing Stree
Memo and congressional hearings:

"We all thought that Bush was lying when he said that
we had to invade Iraq because of 9/11 and Saddam’s
weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). Well, now we have
proof. A British journalist uncovered a memo to Tony
Blair from his chief of foreign intelligence written
after a series of high-level meetings in Washington
back in July of 2002—months before Colin Powell’s
famous presentation to the United Nations.

Basically, the memo states that the Bush
administration was set on ousting Saddam Hussein
despite the circumstances. However, since that would
violate international law, the administration planned
on using terrorism and WMDs as the pretext, even if
the facts didn’t support it. You can read the entire
memo here, but these are a few of my favorite lines:

"It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to
take military action...but the case was thin. Saddam
was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD
capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or
Iran." In another section, the intelligence advisor
writes: "But the intelligence and facts were being
fixed around the policy."

That’s a smoking gun if I’ve ever smelled one. While
administration officials filled the airwaves talking
about the need to remove Saddam because of his WMDs
and his being an imminent threat, they were confiding
to their closest ally that that really wasn’t true.
Apparently Tony Blair deserved the truth but the
American people didn’t.

Rep. John Conyers and 88 other members of Congress
sent a letter to the president asking five
straightforward questions about the memo (see them
below). Their request has been met with stony silence.
Rep. Conyers is asking the American people to join him
as he tries to get some answers, by signing the letter
yourselves. If you are a member of TrueMajority, you
can sign the letter by simply hitting “Reply” and
“Send,” and we’ll add your name. If you were forwarded
this e-mail or would like to read the full text of the
letter, simply click here:

http://action.truemajority.org/campaign/DowningStreetMemo



8) Generation Debt:

http://villagevoice.com/news/index.php?issue=0524&page;=kamenetz&id;=64870

Generation Debt: The New Economics of Being Young
High Interest in Low Interest

Student borrowers scramble to beat a deadline for
cheap rates

by Anya Kamenetz
June 9th, 2005 5:15 PM

If you have federal student loans, the date July 1
should be in flashing red lights. That's the deadline
to consolidate loans at the lowest interest rate ever.
Instead of making multiple payments to different
lenders at variable interest rates, you'd have one
monthly payment at a rate that, crucially, will stick
in the same low place throughout the life of the loan.
Recent grads, still in their six-month grace period,
can lock in a rate as low as 2.77 percent, and
borrowers already paying can go as low as 3.375
percent.
"My dad's applying for consolidation now," says Ryman
Sneed, 22, a North Carolina native who graduated from
Marymount Manhattan College with a BFA in drama last
month and is auditioning while waitressing full-time
at Bowlmor Lanes. "I'll start making payments in
August. To be honest, I don't really know what all
goes into that. I just know I have to pay off the
loans and factor it into my expenses."

Going through consolidation may seem like a bit of
extra red tape in an already complicated process, but
in this case it's worth it. According to lending
company Nelnet, a grad like Sneed, who owes $20,000,
could save ab
out $4,300 over a 20-year repayment
period by locking in the current rate. On July 1, the
rates, set annually by the results of a 91-day
Treasury bill auction, will be hopping to 4.7 percent
for new grads and 5.3 percent for others. That's the
biggest single rate hike in the 40-year history of
student loans.

Consolidation only becomes a bad value, says Kate Rube
of the State PIRGs' Higher Education Project, when
borrowers take advantage of the opportunity to
procrastinate. "You don't need to stretch out your
payments just because you're consolidating, and
students shouldn't let lenders tell them differently.
You should pay on a monthly basis as much as you can
manage." In other words, don't forego 10 high-payment
years for three decades of obligation and compounding
interest.

There's evidence that grads like Sneed are rushing
through the consolidation window. Local-news outlets
from St. Louis to Syracuse have run stories on the
change. Alumni e-mail lists are abuzz. Consolidation
lenders are bombarding students with solicitations.
College financial aid offices are doing their part
too, sending out e-mails and hosting information
sessions.

Still, as Sneed suggests, it's not always easy to get
overwhelmed grads to pay attentions. "A month ago, we
physically mailed out 800 invitations to students who
had loans to let them know it's in your best interest
to consolidate now," says Chloe Haygood, a cheerful
financial-aid representative at Tulane University in
New Orleans. "All of our preferred lenders came out.
We had a turnout of 50 or 60 people. It was finals
week, so we'll attribute it to that!" 

For those a few years out of school, consolidation can
be even more daunting. Tamala Dunn earned her B.A.
from Rutgers in 1998. Over the years, she received a
series of deferments and forbearances because of low
income. By the time she finally started making
payments this January, the initial $16,000 had
ballooned, with interest and fees, to around $27,000.
"I came across an article that indicated this was the
final month to get low interest rates," said Dunn, now
a mother of four. "I'm still trying to figure out the
consolidation process and who I should choose for my
lender."

Haygood reminds anyone considering consolidation to
start by going to http://nslds.ed.gov, a government
database where you can check the current status and
originators of all your student loans. If you hold
loans from more than one lender, you have the right to
shop around, and it's worth it: Some plans come with a
.25 percentage point reduction on the existing
interest rates, others allow consolidators to keep
their six-month grace period—which is ordinarily
waived upon consolidation—and some will discount the
interest or the principal after a certain number of
on-time payments.

Borrowers should also consider getting a consolidation
loan directly from the federal government by going to
loanconsolidation.ed.gov. The feds offer a variety of
repayment plans, including an income-contingent plan.
The State PIRGs offer their own website,
pirg.org/consolidation.

The Department of Education has announced that current
students, for the first time, will be allowed to
consolidate, if they're willing to start paying back
their loans as soon as they graduate. The only catch
is that if you've already consolidated once, you won't
be able to do it again unless you go back to school
and get another loan.

Consolidation is such a great deal for students, in
fact, that the big lenders would like to make it go
away. "They don't like it because it encourages so
much competition," says Rube of the State PIRGs. She
cites lender-backed bills now in Congress to eliminate
fixed-rate consolidation, which the Higher Education
Project is opposing.

For now, though, the lenders still have to beg for
your business. "I've never seen it this competitive,"
says Haygood, a 2002 graduate of the University of New
Orleans, who has her own student loans from her first
year of graduate school and is herself planning to
consolidate. "I've received e-mails from two different
lenders, saying 'We have your application all ready to
go, just sign here!' ” go to next article in news -> 

1) Cole on the Downing Street Memo and the blog world.
Once again, he's right on the mark (go to
www.juancole.com to read the posting with relevant
links):

The Downing Street Memos and the Revenge of the
Bloggers

When Michael Smith of the London Times wrote about a
further leaked British cabinet document on
decision-making about the Iraq war in July 2003, he
did not simply report the revelations in the document.

Most commentators on the Smith story have missed his
open acknowledgment of the role of the blogging world
in turning the Downing Street Memo and other leaked
British documents from a provincial Whitehall story
into a world (and American) phenomenon. Smith writes,



"The briefing paper is certain to add to the pressure,
particularly on the American president, because of the
damaging revelation that Bush and Blair agreed on
regime change in April 2002 and then looked for a way
to justify it.

There has been a growing storm of protest in America,
created by last month’s publication of the minutes in
The Sunday Times. A host of citizens, including many
internet bloggers, have demanded to know why the
Downing Street memo (often shortened to “the DSM” on
websites) has been largely ignored by the US
mainstream media." [Emphasis added.]



If this story had broken in the 1970s, it probably
would just have been buried by the mainstream US press
and remained an oddity of UK's Fleet Street. But here
you have the Times of London actually acknowledging
the wind under its sails from the blogging world!

Smith continues:


"Frustrated at the refusal by the White House to
respond to their letter, the congressmen [led by John
Conyers] have set up a website —
www.downingstreetmemo.com — to collect signatures on a
petition demanding the same answers.

Conyers promised to deliver it to Bush once it reached
250,000 signatures. By Friday morning it already had
more than 500,000 with as many as 1m expected to have
been obtained when he delivers it to the White House
on Thursday.

AfterDowningStreet.org, another website set up as a
result of the memo, is calling for a congressional
committee to consider whether Bush’s actions as
depicted in the memo constitute grounds for
impeachment.



So Smith not only acknowledges the pressure put on the
US corporate media by the bloggers, but he also points
to a virtual social movement around the DSM, with
emails and petitions circulating in the hundreds of
thousands and giving the Democrats in Congress their
first high-profile investigatory opportunity of the
Bush presidency.

The seeping of blogistan into the pages of the Times
of London with regard to its own scoops seems to me a
bellwether of the kinds of changes that are being
produced in our information environment by the
blogging phenomenon. The gatekeepers at the New York
Times and the Washington Post can no longer decide
whether a leak is a story or a non-story. The public
decides what a story is.

The magnitude of the change is clear in the coverage
at the Washington Post. The post, like the New York
Times, Newsday, and others, ignored the original
Downing Street Memo, published in the London Times on
May 1.

The first Washington Post story on the Downing Street
Memo was not published until May 13, nearly two weeks
after the leak. Walter Pincus, despite doing an
excellent job in explaining the significance of the
Memo, was however relegated by the editors to page 18.

Admittedly, the leaked memo did pose problems for the
mainstream media. In order to protect its source, the
Times of London had not made available a facsimile of
the original, but just retyped it and put it up in
HTML. After the trouble Dan Rather got into last
summer over the document purportedly about Bush's
service record, any news editor would be nervous about
jumping on the DSM bandwagon. Wikipedia notes, "On
June 8, 2005, USA Today printed an article by their
senior assignment editor for foreign news, Jim Cox,
saying with respect to the memo, "We could not obtain
the memo or a copy of it from a reliable source. ...
There was no explicit confirmation of its authenticity
from (Blair's office). And it was disclosed four days
before the British elections, raising concerns about
the timing." Bloggers made fun of Cox for "not knowing
where to find the memo," but they don't have to worry
about this issue as much, since they mostly aren't
professional journalists. If the memo turned out to be
a fake, they could just say "ooops," what did I know?
As a professional historian, I had more at stake. But
I felt that the wording of the leaked memo, its
details, and its fit with what else we knew, were
sufficient to authenticate it.

Further, professional journalists have a credo that
they don't just poach on other people's scoops. You
would want to develop your own sources and have
something to add to the story before doing a
front-pager on it. I would argue that this credo is
counter-productive and easily dealt with. You could
kick it to the op-ed page and do commentary. (This is
how the bloggers handled it, and the indispensable
Paul Krugman weighed in on May 16 this way for the New
York Times.) Or you could do a story about the
reaction to the leak in the UK, which would give you
your own hook. I personally think that editors who
don't want to cover a story use their lack of original
leads as an excuse to sit on it.

The cabinet briefing paper leaked on Sunday is
instructive. This time a companion piece was written
by Walter Pincus for the Washington Post, and it
received front-page treatment.

Pincus writes,


"That memo and other internal British government
documents were originally obtained by Michael Smith,
who writes for the London Sunday Times. Excerpts were
made available to The Washington Post, and the
material was confirmed as authentic by British sources
who sought anonymity because they are not authorized
to discuss the matter."


This passage is worded in such a way as to suggest
that Smith himself made the documents and some British
contacts available to Pincus. If so, it was both
remarkably generous and also very smart of him. He
solved some of the main problems that the US press had
had in covering the story, at least with regard to the
Post, and ensured that it reverberated on this side of
the pond. I don't mean to take anything away from the
prowess of Pincus, a first-rate reporter, who may well
have in the meantime developed his own sources in
London. I'm just going by the diction, which admits
that Smith first obtained the new briefing paper and
then goes into the passive mood, saying that excerpts
"were made available" to the Post.

The positioning of Pincus's article is clearly in part
a result of the enormous pressure the bloggers and the
public have put on the Post on this issue. Indeed, it
is probably the case that having "ombudsmen" at the
papers of record, who discuss and explain editorial
decisions, is itself a response to the interactivity
of contemporary culture, exemplified by the internet.

Linguist Jean-Philippe Marcotte at Stanford, in an
email to me today, contrasts the Pincus article to
the
treatment given the new revelations at the New York
Times:


You may by now have seen the NYT's deeply buried take
on the new DSM, written by David Sanger, "Prewar
British Memo Says War Decision Wasn't Made", which
turns on a tendentious reading of the phrase "no
political decisions". In the context of the memo, it
seems clear that these decisions concern the strategy
by which the conditions or framework for military
action [are created]; but Sanger interprets it to mean
what the article title says, and misses completely the
bit about using the UN process to justify, not avoid,
the war. The tone is strikingly defensive, effectively
claiming that the Times reported on this memo two
weeks before it was even written.

The contrast with the London Sunday Times reading, and
yours, is stark. At least when the Washington Post
missed the point they put their story on the front
page...

Thanks,

Jean-Phlippe Marcotte




Think Progress, a progressive Web site, surveys the
whole batch of leaked British cabinet documents on war
decision-making, and concludes that they demonstrate a
full knowledge on the part of the Blair government of
the flimsiness of the pretexts being put forward for
going to war against Iraq. Like Marcotte, they think
that the Washington Post missed this aspect of the
story.

The bloggers have forced the issue into the corporate
media, and are helping create a real buzz around the
Conyers hearings scheduled for Thursday.

Conyers and his staff are well aware that ordinarily
hearings held by members of the minority party in
Congress (which therefore are unlikely to have teeth)
are routinely ignored by the corporate media. They are
placing their hopes in the blogging world to cover the
hearings and get the word out. They are planning to
release further documents corroborating the Downing
Street Memo.

This entire affair could be a harbinger of what is
coming in 2007. If the Democrats can take back the
Senate in 2006, all of a sudden they could schedule
real investigatory hearings at the Senate Intelligence
Committee, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and
the Senate Armed Services Committee, into Douglas
Feith's Office of Special Plans, into Cheney's
pressure on the CIA analysts, into the fabrication of
intelligence and the political lies that dragged this
country into the Iraq quagmire. Imagine what the
Republicans did to Bill Clinton for merely fibbing
about a desultory relationship (13 meetings) with a
young woman that did not even involve intercourse.
What would be the appropriate punishment for lying
about Iraq's non-existent nuclear weapons program? Or
launching a war of aggression in contravention of the
United Nations Charter? Bush knows very well he will
be a lame duck by January 2007. The real question is
whether he will end up being roasted duck.

Certainly, the end of the story will depend far less
on the contemporary equivalents of Katherine Graham
and Ben Bradlee, who gave Woodward and Bernstein their
heads in uncovering the Watergate scandal, than would
have otherwise been the case. Such members of the
press and editorial elite used to get to decide
whether to bury a scandal or pursue it. Now, that
power has been democratized by the world wide web.
Bloggers will help to decide the end of the story.


2) Save Louisiana's Condom Program Petition:

http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/savecondom_6_10_2005/ud7ed54r5xbj57?


3) Anti-Republicanist speaks out:

Why I'm Joining the GOP
Leaving the left for fun and profit
 
by Jeff Gillenkirk
 
After a lifetime voting for and working for Democratic
candidates andindependents, I'm finally going to make
the switch and become aRepublican.
The reasons are many, not the least of which is age. I
turned 55recently and, having lived more than half my
life, I can't afford toworry anymore about the other
guy. It's time for me.
 
As a Republican, I can now proudly -- indeed,
defiantly -- pledge tonever again vote for anyone who
raises taxes for any reason. To hellwith roads,
bridges, schools, police and fire protection,
Medicare,Social Security and regulation of the
airwaves.
 
President Bush has promised to give me more tax cuts
even though ourfederal government owes trillions of
dollars to its creditors. Butthat's someone else's
problem, not mine. Republicans are about the hereand
now, and I'm here now.
 
As a Republican, I can favor exploiting the
environment for everythingshe's got. No need to worry
about quaint notions like posterity andnatural legacy.
There are plenty of resources left for everyone, and
ifwe don't use them, someone else will.
 
I want a party that doesn't worry about things before
we have to.Republicans refuse to get hog-tied by
theories such as global warming,ozone depletion,
fished-out oceans and disappearing wetlands. The
realproblems -- if there are any -- aren't forecast to
take hold for atleast 50 years. So what do I care?
I'll be dead.
 
As a Republican, I can swagger and clamor for war --
in Iraq,Afghanistan, Colombia, wherever -- even though
I've never fought in oneor even been in the military.
I can claim that we're fighting forDemocracy, ignoring
reports of torture at Abu Ghraib, Bagram Air Baseand
Guantanamo Bay, and a spreading gulag of secret
detention centersaround the world.
 
Freedom, as every American should know after spending
$300 billion forwars in Afghanistan and Iraq, isn't
free.
 
As a Republican, I can insist on strict moral values
when it comes tosex and ignore the growing moral
chasms in business, politics, sports,journalism and
the leadership of the Roman Catholic Church.
 
A society that loses control of its sexual urges faces
unwantedpregnancies, socially transmitted disease,
broken families. Thoseoverzealous about wealth,
however, produce only a higher GDP, lifelongsecurity
for their family and more minimum wage jobs for the
lowerclasses. What's wrong with that?
 
As a Republican, I can favor strict punishment of
criminals, except forthose who happen to be my friends
or neighbors. Isn't that the verydefinition of
community -- looking out for friends and family?
 
I will be pro-death penalty and anti-abortion,
pro-child but anti-childcare, for education but
against funding of public schools. As aRepublican,
I'll have a better chance of getting to spout my
opinionsin the media, which for some reason seems
convinced that since Bush wasre-elected with the
smallest electoral margin of any sitting presidentin
history, liberals are passe.
 
As a Republican, I'll say goodbye to "old Jesus" and
hello to "newJesus. " Sure Christ started out as a
liberal Jew, and look where thatgot him. Compassion,
love and diatribes against the rich only encouragethe
weak and punish the most successful among us. The
Jesus thatRepublicans worship is a muscular, decisive,
pro-war crusader hard atwork cleansing the world of
evildoers, not, God forbid, turning theother cheek.
 
My decision to become a Republican didn't come easily.
For years Iclung to the idea that the foundation of a
democratic society was ourimplied social contract,
each of us committing some level of personalsacrifice
to the common good of all.
 
I regarded taxes as dues w
e pay for better roads and
schools, safeinspection of meat and dairy products,
maintenance of parks andprotection of wilderness
areas. I see now that looking out for thecommon good
resulted in shortchanging the most important element
inthis formula -- me.
 
Let Democrats continue promising the "greatest good
for the greatestnumber." Republicans clearly have my
number -- No. 1.
 
I'm sure a lot of my friends reading this will ask me,
"How can yousleep?" My answer will be, "Who's got
time? I'm busy earning money."While they're
bellyaching about rising deficits, the outsourcing
ofjobs and casualties in Iraq, I'll be marveling at
the march of freedomin the Middle East, upticks in the
GDP and the president's plan to linkSocial Security to
the magic of the marketplace.
 
As a Republican, I simply won't listen to bad news
anymore. Bad newsdoesn't get me or my family anywhere.
If you don't have anything goodto say about somebody,
don't say anything at all -- unless it happensto be
about a Democrat, of course.
 
Jeff Gillenkirk was a speechwriter for former New York
Gov. MarioCuomo. He lives in San Francisco.      


4) Iraq's Universities:

Iraq universities battle for 21st century renaissance:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050612/wl_mideast_afp/iraqeducation_050612231004

1) Juan Cole explains in great detail why Blair might
still face jail time for the US/UK crime of aggression
against Iraq in 2003.  For links to all of the reports
he cites, go to his blog. 

This is the legal argument as to why Bush should also
be prosecuted in the ICC -- which in turn explains why
the US refused to be a signatory and tried to bludgeon
the ICC out of existence in the late 90's and onwards
till today (the excuse given at the time was that it
might "impede US efforts to participate in UN
peacekeeping operations"[!])

To be governed by bonafide war criminals is a problem.


http://www.juancole.com/

Bush and Blair Committed to War in April, 2002
Leaked Cabinet Briefing Shows British Knew War was
Illegal

The London Times has dropped another bombshell
document concerning the planning of the Iraq war in
Washington and London.

The leaked Cabinet office briefing paper for the July
23, 2002, meeting of principals in London, the minutes
of which have become notorious as the Downing Street
Memo, contains key context for that memo. The briefing
paper warns the British cabinet in essence that they
are facing jail time because Blair promised Bush at
Crawford in April, 2002, that he would go to war
against Iraq with the Americans.

As Michael Smith reports for the London Times, "regime
change" is illegal in international law without a
United Nations Security Council resolution or other
recognized sanction (national self-defense, or
rescuing a population from genocide, e.g.). Since the
United Kingdom is signatory to the International
Criminal Court, British officials could be brought up
on charges for crimes like "Aggression."

Smith quotes the briefing and then remarks on how it
shows Bush and Blair to be lying when they invoke
their approach to the UN as proof that they sought a
peaceful resolution of the Iraq crisis:



' “It is just possible that an ultimatum could be cast
in terms which Saddam would reject,” the document
says. But if he accepted it and did not attack the
allies, they would be “most unlikely” to obtain the
legal justification they needed.

The suggestions that the allies use the UN to justify
war contradicts claims by Blair and Bush, repeated
during their Washington summit last week, that they
turned to the UN in order to avoid having to go to
war. The attack on Iraq finally began in March 2003. '



The Cabinet briefing makes crystal clear that Blair
had cast his lot in with Bush on an elective war
against Iraq already in April, 2002:


"2. When the Prime Minister discussed Iraq with
President Bush at Crawford in April he said that the
UK would support military action to bring about regime
change, provided that certain conditions were met:
efforts had been made to construct a coalition/shape
public opinion, the Israel-Palestine Crisis was
quiescent, and the options for action to eliminate
Iraq's WMD through the UN weapons inspectors had been
exhausted."


This passage is unambiguous and refutes the weird
suggestion by Michael Kinsley that the Downing Street
Memo did not establish that the Bush administration
had committed to war by July, 2002.

British Attorney General Lord Goldsmith is quoted in
the Downing Street Memo:
"The Attorney-General said that the desire for regime
change was not a legal base for military action. There
were three possible legal bases: self-defence,
humanitarian intervention, or UNSC authorisation. The
first and second could not be the base in this case.
Relying on UNSCR 1205 of three years ago would be
difficult. The situation might of course change."


The briefing paper discusses this issue further:


"11. US views of international law vary from that of
the UK and the international community. Regime change
per se is not a proper basis for military action under
international law. But regime change could result from
action that is otherwise lawful. We would regard the
use of force against Iraq, or any other state, as
lawful if exercised in the right of individual or
collective self-defence, if carried out to avert an
overwhelming humanitarian catastrophe, or authorised
by the UN Security Council."


It makes me deeply ashamed as an American in the
tradition of Madison, Jefferson, Franklin, Lincoln,
and King, that in their private communications our
international allies openly admit that the United
States of America routinely disregards international
law. The Geneva Conventions were enacted by the United
Nations and adopted into national law in order to
assure that Nazi-style violations of basic human
rights never again occurred without the threat of
punishment after the war. We have an administration
that views the Geneva Conventions as "quaint." The US
has vigorously opposed the International Criminal
Court.

The cabinet briefing, like Lord Goldsmith, is
skeptical that any of the three legal grounds for war
existed with regard to Iraq. Iraq was not an imminent
threat to the US or the UK. Saddam's regime was
brutal, but its major killing sprees were in the past
in 2002. And, the UNSC had not authorized a war
against Iraq.


"The legal position would depend on the precise
circumstances at the time. Legal bases for an invasion
of Iraq are in principle conceivable in both the first
two instances but would be difficult to establish
because of, for example, the tests of immediacy and
proportionality. Further legal advice would be needed
on this point."



The tactic of presenting Saddam with an ultimatum that
he should allow back in weapons inspectors, in hopes
he would refuse, is again highlighted in this
document:


"14. It is just possible that an ultimatum could be
cast in terms which Saddam would reject (because he is
unwilling to accept unfettered access) and which would
not be regarded as unreasonable by the international
community. However, failing that (or an Iraqi attack)
we would be most unlikely to achieve a legal base for
military action by January 2003. "


In his report about the Cabinet briefing, Walter
Pincus focuses on the passages that worry about the
apparent lack of planning by Bush for the day after
the war ended.

The briefing says:



"19. Even with a legal base and a viable military
plan, we would still need to ensure that the benefits
of action outweigh the risks. . . A post-war
occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and
costly nation-building exercise. As already made
clear, the US military plans are virtually silent on
this point. Washington could look to us to share a
disproportionate share of the burden. Further work is
required to define more precisely the means by which
the desired endstate would be created, in particular
what form of Government might replace Saddam Hussein's
regime and the timescale within which it would be
possible to identify a successor. We must also
consider in greater detail the impact of military
action on other UK interests in the region."


The British were clearly afraid that the US would get
them into Iraq without a plan, and then Bush might
just prove fickle and decamp, leaving the poor British
holding the bag.

The briefing is also prescient that the Middle East
region would be hostile or at most neutral with regard
to an Iraq war, and that less international
participation would lessen the chances of success.

I found the passage on the information campaign
chilling:


"20. Time will be required to prepare public opinion
in the UK that it is necessary to take military action
against Saddam Hussein. There would also need to be a
substantial effort to secure the support of
Parliament. An information campaign will be needed
which has to be closely related to an overseas
information campaign designed to influence Saddam
Hussein, the Islamic World and the wider international
community. This will need to give full coverage to the
threat posed by Saddam Hussein, including his WMD, and
the legal justification for action. "



The polite diplomatic language hides the implications
that there would be a global black psy-ops campaign in
favor of the war, conducted from London. Since the
rest of the briefing already admits that there was no
legal justification for action, the proposal of an
information campaign that would maintain that such a
justification existed must be seen as deeply
dishonest.

One press report said that the British military had
planted stories in the American press aimed at getting
up the Iraq war. A shadowy group called the Rockingham
cell was apparently behind it. Similar disinformation
campaigns have been waged by Israeli military
intelligence, aiming at influencing US public opinion.
(Israeli intelligence has have even planted false
stories about its enemies in Arabic newspapers, in
hopes that Israeli newspapers would translate them
into Hebrew and English, and they would be picked up
as credible from there in the West.

The International Criminal Court home page is here. We
find in its authorizing legislation, the Rome Statute
of the International Criminal Court, the Section on
Jurisdiction, which reads as follows:



"Article 5
Crimes within the jurisdiction of the Court

1. The jurisdiction of the Court shall be limited to
the most serious crimes of concern to the
international community as a whole. The Court has
jurisdiction in accordance with this Statute with
respect to the following crimes:

(a) The crime of genocide;

(b) Crimes against humanity;

(c) War crimes;

(d) The crime of aggression."


It is not clear to me that the court is yet able to
take up the crime of aggression, because legal work
remained to be done in defining the crime precisely
and in having that language adopted by the UNSC.

If it were able to do so, some groups in Europe may
now feel that there is a basis for proceeding against
the Blair government for knowingly committing an act
of aggression. They might argue that when, in March,
2003, it became clear that the United Nations Security
Council would not authorize a war against Iraq; and
when it was clear from the reports of the UN weapons
inspectors that they were finding no chemical,
biological or nuclear weapons programs; and when it
was murky as to whether Saddam was actively killing
any significant numbers of Iraqis in 2001-2003--that
Blair should have pulled out and refused to cooperate
in an Iraq invasion. The cabinet brief and the memo of
the July 23 meeting demonstrate conclusively that
members of the Blair government knew that they were
involved in plans that were as of that moment illegal,
and that no legal basis for them might be forthcoming.
Ignorance is no excuse under the law, but here even
ignorance could not be pleaded.

Since the US is not a signatory to the ICC, it is not
clear that it could proceed against Bush et al.

posted by Juan @ 6/12/2005 06:30:00 AM   



2) Naomi Klein on debt forgiveness.  As usual, she's
right on the mark. Read it in the context of this
week's "peak oil" article:

http://www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20050627&s;=klein

lookout by Naomi Klein

A Noose, Not a Bracelet
[from the June 27, 2005 issue]

Gordon Brown has a new idea about how to "make poverty
history" in time for the G-8 summit in Scotland. With
Washington so far refusing to double its aid to Africa
by 2015, the British Chancellor is appealing to the
"richer oil-producing states" of the Middle East to
fill the funding gap. "Oil wealth urged to save
Africa," reads the headline in London's Observer.

Here is a better idea: Instead of Saudi Arabia's oil
wealth being used to "save Africa," how about if
Africa's oil wealth was used to save Africa--along
with its gas, diamond, gold, platinum, chromium,
ferroalloy and coal wealth?

With all this noblesse oblige focused on saving Africa
from its misery, it seems like a good time to remember
someone else who tried to make poverty history: Ken
Saro-Wiwa, who was killed ten years ago this November
by the Nigerian government, along with eight other
Ogoni activists, sentenced to death by hanging. Their
crime was daring to insist that Nigeria was not poor
at all but rich, and that it was political decisions
made in the interests of Western multinational
corporations that kept its people in desperate
poverty. Saro-Wiwa gave his life to the idea that the
vast oil wealth of the Niger Delta must leave behind
more than polluted rivers, charred farmland, rancid
air and crumbling schools. He asked not for charity,
pity or "relief" but for justice....


3) This was a good analysis of last week's French and
Dutch no votes.  First appeared last week in the
Guardian:

http://hnn.us/roundup/entries/12382.html

Timothy Garton Ash: Decadent Europe

Timothy Garton Ash, in the Guardian (6-9-05)

[Mr. Ash is Professor of European Studies at the
University of Oxford and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover
Institution, Stanford. He is the author, most
recently, of Free World: America, Europe and the
Surprising Future of the West. (April 2005)]

Contemplating the European Crisis (I think a capital C
is called for) I find myself driven even to reading
Toynbee. Not Polly Toynbee of the Guardian, whose work
I always follow with the greatest pleasure, but her
long-dead and largely forgotten ancestor, Arnold
Toynbee, the philosophical historian of the rise and
fall of civilisations....


4) Internet Bill up before Congress:

A new bill in Congress (HR 2726) could take away
low-cost, high-speed Internet access in every city
across the country.

The “Preserving Innovation in Telecom Act” would let
cable and telecom companies shut down competing
municipal projects that would offer universal,
affordable access to broadband services.

We need to tell Congress to oppose this bill. I just
sent a letter to my representative.

Please go to
http://www.freepress.net/action/sessionsbill and send
a letter to yours. It only takes a few minutes.

We must send a clear message to Congress that local
communities — not the giant telephone and cable
companies — should determine their own communications
needs.

www.truthtalkz.blogspot.com
www.truthtalkziraq.blogspot.com

My apologies for the lack of postings in the past
month.  I'm on the road, and internet connections are
intermittent nowadays.  If you only read one article,
read the last one...

1) Baghdad Bob, DC George.  This op-ed by Juan Cole
pretty much says it all.

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2005/06/09/baghdad_bob/index_np.html

June 9, 2005  |  The sheer dishonesty of the Bush
administration whenever it speaks about the situation
in Iraq was on display again during Bush's Tuesday
press conference with visiting British Prime Minister
Tony Blair. In recent weeks Bush has repeatedly
expressed wild optimism, utterly unfounded in reality,
about the political process in Iraq and about the
ability of the new Iraqi government and army to win
the guerrilla war. He has if anything been outdone in
this rhetoric by Vice President Dick Cheney. This
pie-in-the-sky attitude, which increasingly few
believe, degrades our civic discourse, and it
endangers the national security of the United States.


2) I urge you to check www.juancole.com every day.
There is great material on this site, and he's getting
better over the summer as he's devoting even more time
to the site.


3) Downing Street Memo and all that (for those who
STILL think Iraq's intelligence fiasco was an "honest
mistake," or the fault of weakened intelligence
agencies):

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/panorama/4336727.stm

Iraq, Tony & the Truth: Timeline 
Iraq, Tony and the Truth

The Prime Minister is convinced that he was right to
invade Iraq. To do so, he needed the backing of Labour
MPs. Two years on, Panorama tells the story of what Mr
Blair did not reveal to them, and us, before sending
British troops into battle.

This timeline includes the key documentary evidence
used in the film, along with links to the Prime
Minister's speeches. The leaked secret documents were
obtained and published by The Daily Telegraph.


4) I also urge readers to check
www.abutamam.blogspot.com , for a chilling view of
what happens in Iraq (although I'm not always certain
about the accuracy of some of the postings).


5) Falluja, the day after video:

http://www.diario.it/?page=wl05060100#italiano

FALLUJA-THE DAY AFTER (ENGLISH)
This video has been recorded in Falluja in early
Janury, 2005, when the city was reopened to civilians
after the American attack of November 8th, 2004
(“Operation Al-Fajr”, i. e. “the dawn”).

It’s an important document since the city was closed
to reporters at that moment. This video was handed
over to the Italian weekly magazine Diario by the
Studies Center of Human Rights and Democracy of
Falluja. Diario issued a broad enquire on Falluja
battle on May 27th, 2005.

“Falluja-The day After” shows the total devastation of
the Iraqi town, the corpses of the victims, the mass
graves, the exhumation of many corpses by local rescue
teams in order to try to recognize some of the
victims. The last corpse shown in this video belongs
to a 14 year old girl.

The video lasts 18 minutes and 20 seconds.


6) Building Iraq's Army: Mission Improbable:


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/09/AR2005060902245.html

Project in North Reveals Deep Divide Between U.S. and
Iraqi Forces

By Anthony Shadid and Steve Fainaru
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, June 10, 2005; Page A01

BAIJI, Iraq -- An hour before dawn, the sky still
clouded by a dust storm, the soldiers of the Iraqi
army's Charlie Company began their mission with a
ballad to ousted president Saddam Hussein. "We have
lived in humiliation since you left," one sang in
Arabic, out of earshot of his U.S. counterparts. "We
had hoped to spend our life with you."

But the Iraqi soldiers had no clue where they were
going. They shrugged their shoulders when asked what
they would do. The U.S. military had billed the
mission as pivotal in the Iraqis' progress as a
fighting force but had kept the destination and
objectives secret out of fear the Iraqis would leak
the information to insurgents....



7) ICG Report on Iraq's Constitutional Process:

http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/index.cfm?l=1&id;=3506

Iraq: Don't Rush the Constitution
Middle East Report N°42
8 June 2005
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

The next stage in Iraq's political transition, the
drafting and adoption of a permanent constitution,
will be critical to the country's long-term stability.
Iraqis face a dilemma: rush the constitutional process
and meet the current deadline of 15 August 2005 to
prevent the insurgents from scoring further political
points, or encourage a process that is inclusive,
transparent and participatory in an effort to increase
popular buy-in of the final product. While there are
downsides to delay, they are far outweighed by the
dangers of a hurried job that could lead to either
popular rejection of or popular resignation to a text
toward which they feel little sense of ownership or
pride.

The Transitional Administrative Law (TAL) of March
2004 dictates the pace and process of constitutional
drafting and adoption. According to its terms,
drafting must be completed no later than 15 August
2005 and the text put up for popular referendum by 15
October, with elections for a full-term assembly to
follow by 15 December. If successful, this process may
go a long way in drying up support for the insurgents.
Conversely, failure to get the constitutional
endeavour right risks increasing popular discontent
and swelling the ranks of the insurgency.

The experience of other transitional societies is
clear. Popular participation in and acceptance of the
basic pillars of the new order are critical to its
success and longevity. The creation of a foundational
document that not only receives majority support in a
nation-wide referendum but is based on popular input
and consensus may well be the optimal way of whittling
away support for the insurgents (whose hardcore
elements would still need to be tackled militarily)
and stabilising Iraq.

This cannot realistically be done within the extremely
narrow timeframe of just over two months remaining
before 15 August. Far better would be to accept up
front that the deadline cannot be met and take
advantage of the TAL's escape clause to extend it by
six months, to 15 February 2006. This would allow the
Transitional National Assembly (TNA), with the help of
the United Nations
 and other organisations and
governments with the requisite expertise and
resources, to set up a realistic timetable for
bringing in excluded sectors of the population (not
only Sunni Arab leaders but also representatives of
civil society), educating the public about the
deliberations, and consulting widely among Iraqis on
critical choices regarding their nation's political
structure, identity and institutions. With persistent
violence taking on an increasingly sectarian
character, ensuring that the constitution is viewed as
legitimate by all sectors of the population is a vital
necessity.

A different approach in the name of rigid adherence to
the TAL's deadline would risk playing into the
insurgents' hands, condemning Iraq to more violence,
and encouraging those elements that have sought, by
their deliberately sectarian attacks, to plunge the
country into an even deadlier civil war.




8) Marine Recruiters, a bit overzealous:

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/paynter/227497_paynter08.html

When Marine recruiters go way beyond the call

By SUSAN PAYNTER
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST

For mom Marcia Cobb and her teenage son Axel, the
white letters USMC on their caller ID soon spelled,
"Don't answer the phone!"

Marine recruiters began a relentless barrage of calls
to Axel as soon as the mellow, compliant Sedro-Woolley
High School grad had cut his 17th birthday cake. And
soon it was nearly impossible to get the seekers of a
few good men off the line.

With early and late calls ringing in their ears,
Marcia tried using call blocking. And that's when she
learned her first hard lesson. You can't block calls
from the government, her server said. So, after pleas
to "Please stop calling" went unanswered, the family's
"do not answer" order ensued...


9) Move-On Petition:

Last month, the Times of London printed "smoking gun"
evidence that long before the invasion of Iraq the
Bush administration was determined to go to war,
intentionally distorting intelligence, and lying to
the American people.

The proof comes from the classified minutes of a
British cabinet meeting, referred to as the "Downing
Street Memo." So far President Bush has refused to
explain or directly respond to the memo, but pressure
is mounting daily from Congress and the public. This
week Tony Blair visited Washington and the press
finally started asking the obvious questions—creating
a critical opportunity to turn up the heat.

One Congressman, John Conyers of Michigan, has started
a citizens petition—demanding that Bush directly
respond to the evidence of deception contained in the
Downing Street Memo. When half a million Americans
sign, Rep. Conyers will personally deliver the
signatures to the gates of the White House.

If we can reach 500,000 signatures today we can bring
this scandal to light while the story is still hot.
Please add your voice today:

http://www.moveonpac.org/tellthetruth/?id=5653-1300791-BfcQIiUBcK_RVs_rgX8ckg&t;=3



10) If you read one posting today, read this one.  I
guess globetrotting days are about to end:


The Long Emergency


What's going to happen as we start running out of
cheap gas to guzzle?


By JAMES HOWARD KUNSTLER


A few weeks ago, the price of oil ratcheted above
fifty-five dollars a barrel, which is about twenty
dollars a barrel more than a year ago. The next day,
the oil story was buried on page six of the New York
Times business section. Apparently, the price of oil
is not considered significant news, even when it goes
up five bucks a barrel in the span of ten days. That
same day, the stock market shot up more than a hundred
points because, CNN said, government data showed no
signs of inflation. Note to clueless nation: Call
planet Earth.


Carl Jung, one of the fathers of psychology, famously
remarked that "people cannot stand too much reality."
What you're about to read may challenge your
assumptions about the kind of world we live in, and
especially the kind of world into which events are
propelling us. We are in for a rough ride through
uncharted territory.


It has been very hard for Americans -- lost in dark
raptures of nonstop infotainment, recreational
shopping and compulsive motoring -- to make sense of
the gathering forces that will fundamentally alter the
terms of everyday life in our technological society.
Even after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, America is
still sleepwalking into the future. I call this coming
time the Long Emergency.


Most immediately we face the end of the
cheap-fossil-fuel era. It is no exaggeration to state
that reliable supplies of cheap oil and natural gas
underlie everything we identify as the necessities of
modern life -- not to mention all of its comforts and
luxuries: central heating, air conditioning, cars,
airplanes, electric lights, inexpensive clothing,
recorded music, movies, hip-replacement surgery,
national defense -- you name it.


The few Americans who are even aware that there is a
gathering global-energy predicament usually
misunderstand the core of the argument. That argument
states that we don't have to run out of oil to start
having severe problems with industrial civilization
and its dependent systems. We only have to slip over
the all-time production peak and begin a slide down
the arc of steady depletion.


The term "global oil-production peak" means that a
turning point will come when the world produces the
most oil it will ever produce in a given year and,
after that, yearly production will inexorably decline.
It is usually represented graphically in a bell curve.
The peak is the top of the curve, the halfway point of
the world's all-time total endowment, meaning half the
world's oil will be left. That seems like a lot of
oil, and it is, but there's a big catch: It's the half
that is much more difficult to extract, far more
costly to get, of much poorer quality and located
mostly in places where the people hate us. A
substantial amount of it will never be extracted.


The United States passed its own oil peak -- about 11
million barrels a day -- in 1970, and since then
production has dropped steadily. In 2004 it ran just
above 5 million barrels a day (we get a tad more from
natural-gas condensates). Yet we consume roughly 20
million barrels a day now. That means we have to
import about two-thirds of our oil, and the ratio will
continue to worsen.


The U.S. peak in 1970 brought on a portentous change
in geoeconomic power. Within a few years, foreign
producers, chiefly OPEC, were setting the price of
oil, and this in turn led to the oil crises of the
1970s. In response, frantic development of non-OPEC
oil, especially the North Sea fields of England and
Norway, essentially saved the West's ass for about two
decades. Since 1999, these fields have entered
depletion. Meanwhile, worldwide discovery of new oil
has steadily declined to insignificant levels in 2003
and 2004.


Some "cornucopians" claim that the Earth has something
like a creamy nougat center of "abiotic" oil that will
naturally replenish the g
reat oil fields of the world.
The facts speak differently. There has been no
replacement whatsoever of oil already extracted from
the fields of America or any other place.


Now we are faced with the global oil-production peak.
The best estimates of when this will actually happen
have been somewhere between now and 2010. In 2004,
however, after demand from burgeoning China and India
shot up, and revelations that Shell Oil wildly
misstated its reserves, and Saudi Arabia proved
incapable of goosing up its production despite
promises to do so, the most knowledgeable experts
revised their predictions and now concur that 2005 is
apt to be the year of all-time global peak production.


It will change everything about how we live.


To aggravate matters, American natural-gas production
is also declining, at five percent a year, despite
frenetic new drilling, and with the potential of much
steeper declines ahead. Because of the oil crises of
the 1970s, the nuclear-plant disasters at Three Mile
Island and Chernobyl and the acid-rain problem, the
U.S. chose to make gas its first choice for
electric-power generation. The result was that just
about every power plant built after 1980 has to run on
gas. Half the homes in America are heated with gas. To
further complicate matters, gas isn't easy to import.
Here in North America, it is distributed through a
vast pipeline network. Gas imported from overseas
would have to be compressed at minus-260 degrees
Fahrenheit in pressurized tanker ships and unloaded
(re-gasified) at special terminals, of which few exist
in America. Moreover, the first attempts to site new
terminals have met furious opposition because they are
such ripe targets for terrorism.


Some other things about the global energy predicament
are poorly understood by the public and even our
leaders. This is going to be a permanent energy
crisis, and these energy problems will synergize with
the disruptions of climate change, epidemic disease
and population overshoot to produce higher orders of
trouble.


We will have to accommodate ourselves to fundamentally
changed conditions.


No combination of alternative fuels will allow us to
run American life the way we have been used to running
it, or even a substantial fraction of it. The wonders
of steady technological progress achieved through the
reign of cheap oil have lulled us into a kind of
Jiminy Cricket syndrome, leading many Americans to
believe that anything we wish for hard enough will
come true. These days, even people who ought to know
better are wishing ardently for a seamless transition
from fossil fuels to their putative replacements.


The widely touted "hydrogen economy" is a particularly
cruel hoax. We are not going to replace the U.S.
automobile and truck fleet with vehicles run on fuel
cells. For one thing, the current generation of fuel
cells is largely designed to run on hydrogen obtained
from natural gas. The other way to get hydrogen in the
quantities wished for would be electrolysis of water
using power from hundreds of nuclear plants. Apart
from the dim prospect of our building that many
nuclear plants soon enough, there are also numerous
severe problems with hydrogen's nature as an element
that present forbidding obstacles to its use as a
replacement for oil and gas, especially in storage and
transport.


Wishful notions about rescuing our way of life with
"renewables" are also unrealistic. Solar-electric
systems and wind turbines face not only the enormous
problem of scale but the fact that the components
require substantial amounts of energy to manufacture
and the probability that they can't be manufactured at
all without the underlying support platform of a
fossil-fuel economy. We will surely use solar and wind
technology to generate some electricity for a period
ahead but probably at a very local and small scale.


Virtually all "biomass" schemes for using plants to
create liquid fuels cannot be scaled up to even a
fraction of the level at which things are currently
run. What's more, these schemes are predicated on
using oil and gas "inputs" (fertilizers, weed-killers)
to grow the biomass crops that would be converted into
ethanol or bio-diesel fuels. This is a net energy
loser -- you might as well just burn the inputs and
not bother with the biomass products. Proposals to
distill trash and waste into oil by means of thermal
depolymerization depend on the huge waste stream
produced by a cheap oil and gas economy in the first
place.


Coal is far less versatile than oil and gas, extant in
less abundant supplies than many people assume and
fraught with huge ecological drawbacks -- as a
contributor to greenhouse "global warming" gases and
many health and toxicity issues ranging from
widespread mercury poisoning to acid rain. You can
make synthetic oil from coal, but the only time this
was tried on a large scale was by the Nazis under
wartime conditions, using impressive amounts of slave
labor.


If we wish to keep the lights on in America after
2020, we may indeed have to resort to nuclear power,
with all its practical problems and eco-conundrums.
Under optimal conditions, it could take ten years to
get a new generation of nuclear power plants into
operation, and the price may be beyond our means.
Uranium is also a resource in finite supply. We are no
closer to the more difficult project of atomic fusion,
by the way, than we were in the 1970s.


The upshot of all this is that we are entering a
historical period of potentially great instability,
turbulence and hardship. Obviously, geopolitical
maneuvering around the world's richest energy regions
has already led to war and promises more international
military conflict. Since the Middle East contains
two-thirds of the world's remaining oil supplies, the
U.S. has attempted desperately to stabilize the region
by, in effect, opening a big police station in Iraq.
The intent was not just to secure Iraq's oil but to
modify and influence the behavior of neighboring
states around the Persian Gulf, especially Iran and
Saudi Arabia. The results have been far from entirely
positive, and our future prospects in that part of the
world are not something we can feel altogether
confident about.


And then there is the issue of China, which, in 2004,
became the world's second-greatest consumer of oil,
surpassing Japan. China's surging industrial growth
has made it increasingly dependent on the imports we
are counting on. If China wanted to, it could easily
walk into some of these places -- the Middle East,
former Soviet republics in central Asia -- and extend
its hegemony by force. Is America prepared to contest
for this oil in an Asian land war with the Chinese
army? I doubt it. Nor can the U.S. military occupy
regions of the Eastern Hemisphere indefinitely, or
hope to secure either the terrain or the oil
infrastructure of one distant, unfriendly country
after another. A likely scenario is that the U.S.
could exhaust and bankrupt itself trying to do this,
and be forced to withdraw back into our own
hemisphere, having lost access to most of the world's
remaining oil in the process.


We know that our national leaders are hardly
uninformed about this predicament. President George W.
Bush has been briefed on the dangers of the oil-peak
situation as long ago as before the 2000 election an
d
repeatedly since then. In March, the Department of
Energy released a report that officially acknowledges
for the first time that peak oil is for real and
states plainly that "the world has never faced a
problem like this. Without massive mitigation more
than a decade before the fact, the problem will be
pervasive and will not be temporary."


Most of all, the Long Emergency will require us to
make other arrangements for the way we live in the
United States. America is in a special predicament due
to a set of unfortunate choices we made as a society
in the twentieth century. Perhaps the worst was to let
our towns and cities rot away and to replace them with
suburbia, which had the additional side effect of
trashing a lot of the best farmland in America.
Suburbia will come to be regarded as the greatest
misallocation of resources in the history of the
world. It has a tragic destiny. The psychology of
previous investment suggests that we will defend our
drive-in utopia long after it has become a terrible
liability.


Before long, the suburbs will fail us in practical
terms. We made the ongoing development of housing
subdivisions, highway strips, fried-food shacks and
shopping malls the basis of our economy, and when we
have to stop making more of those things, the bottom
will fall out.


The circumstances of the Long Emergency will require
us to downscale and re-scale virtually everything we
do and how we do it, from the kind of communities we
physically inhabit to the way we grow our food to the
way we work and trade the products of our work. Our
lives will become profoundly and intensely local.
Daily life will be far less about mobility and much
more about staying where you are. Anything organized
on the large scale, whether it is government or a
corporate business enterprise such as Wal-Mart, will
wither as the cheap energy props that support bigness
fall away. The turbulence of the Long Emergency will
produce a lot of economic losers, and many of these
will be members of an angry and aggrieved former
middle class.


Food production is going to be an enormous problem in
the Long Emergency. As industrial agriculture fails
due to a scarcity of oil- and gas-based inputs, we
will certainly have to grow more of our food closer to
where we live, and do it on a smaller scale. The
American economy of the mid-twenty-first century may
actually center on agriculture, not information, not
high tech, not "services" like real estate sales or
hawking cheeseburgers to tourists. Farming. This is no
doubt a startling, radical idea, and it raises
extremely difficult questions about the reallocation
of land and the nature of work. The relentless
subdividing of land in the late twentieth century has
destroyed the contiguity and integrity of the rural
landscape in most places. The process of readjustment
is apt to be disorderly and improvisational. Food
production will necessarily be much more
labor-intensive than it has been for decades. We can
anticipate the re-formation of a native-born American
farm-laboring class. It will be composed largely of
the aforementioned economic losers who had to
relinquish their grip on the American dream. These
masses of disentitled people may enter into
quasi-feudal social relations with those who own land
in exchange for food and physical security. But their
sense of grievance will remain fresh, and if
mistreated they may simply seize that land.


The way that commerce is currently organized in
America will not survive far into the Long Emergency.
Wal-Mart's "warehouse on wheels" won't be such a
bargain in a non-cheap-oil economy. The national chain
stores' 12,000-mile manufacturing supply lines could
easily be interrupted by military contests over oil
and by internal conflict in the nations that have been
supplying us with ultra-cheap manufactured goods,
because they, too, will be struggling with similar
issues of energy famine and all the disorders that go
with it.


As these things occur, America will have to make other
arrangements for the manufacture, distribution and
sale of ordinary goods. They will probably be made on
a "cottage industry" basis rather than the factory
system we once had, since the scale of available
energy will be much lower -- and we are not going to
replay the twentieth century. Tens of thousands of the
common products we enjoy today, from paints to
pharmaceuticals, are made out of oil. They will become
increasingly scarce or unavailable. The selling of
things will have to be reorganized at the local scale.
It will have to be based on moving merchandise shorter
distances. It is almost certain to result in higher
costs for the things we buy and far fewer choices.


The automobile will be a diminished presence in our
lives, to say the least. With gasoline in short
supply, not to mention tax revenue, our roads will
surely suffer. The interstate highway system is more
delicate than the public realizes. If the "level of
service" (as traffic engineers call it) is not
maintained to the highest degree, problems multiply
and escalate quickly. The system does not tolerate
partial failure. The interstates are either in
excellent condition, or they quickly fall apart.


America today has a railroad system that the
Bulgarians would be ashamed of. Neither of the two
major presidential candidates in 2004 mentioned
railroads, but if we don't refurbish our rail system,
then there may be no long-range travel or transport of
goods at all a few decades from now. The commercial
aviation industry, already on its knees financially,
is likely to vanish. The sheer cost of maintaining
gigantic airports may not justify the operation of a
much-reduced air-travel fleet. Railroads are far more
energy efficient than cars, trucks or airplanes, and
they can be run on anything from wood to electricity.
The rail-bed infrastructure is also far more
economical to maintain than our highway network.


The successful regions in the twenty-first century
will be the ones surrounded by viable farming
hinterlands that can reconstitute locally sustainable
economies on an armature of civic cohesion. Small
towns and smaller cities have better prospects than
the big cities, which will probably have to contract
substantially. The process will be painful and
tumultuous. In many American cities, such as
Cleveland, Detroit and St. Louis, that process is
already well advanced. Others have further to fall.
New York and Chicago face extraordinary difficulties,
being oversupplied with gigantic buildings out of
scale with the reality of declining energy supplies.
Their former agricultural hinterlands have long been
paved over. They will be encysted in a surrounding
fabric of necrotic suburbia that will only amplify and
reinforce the cities' problems. Still, our cities
occupy important sites. Some kind of urban entities
will exist where they are in the future, but probably
not the colossi of twentieth-century industrialism.


Some regions of the country will do better than others
in the Long Emergency. The Southwest will suffer in
proportion to the degree that it prospered during the
cheap-oil blowout of the late twentieth century. I
predict that Sunbelt states like Arizona and Nevada
will become significantly depopulated, since the
region will be short of water as well as gasoline and
natural gas. Imagine Phoenix without cheap air
conditioning.


I'm not optimistic about the Southeast, either, for
different reasons. I think it will be subject to
substantial levels of violence as the grievances of
the formerly middle class boil over and collide with
the delusions of Pentecostal Christian extremism. The
latent encoded behavior of Southern culture includes
an outsized notion of individualism and the belief
that firearms ought to be used in the defense of it.
This is a poor recipe for civic cohesion.


The Mountain States and Great Plains will face an
array of problems, from poor farming potential to
water shortages to population loss. The Pacific
Northwest, New England and the Upper Midwest have
somewhat better prospects. I regard them as less
likely to fall into lawlessness, anarchy or despotism
and more likely to salvage the bits and pieces of our
best social traditions and keep them in operation at
some level.


These are daunting and even dreadful prospects. The
Long Emergency is going to be a tremendous trauma for
the human race. We will not believe that this is
happening to us, that 200 years of modernity can be
brought to its knees by a world-wide power shortage.
The survivors will have to cultivate a religion of
hope -- that is, a deep and comprehensive belief that
humanity is worth carrying on. If there is any
positive side to stark changes coming our way, it may
be in the benefits of close communal relations, of
having to really work intimately (and physically) with
our neighbors, to be part of an enterprise that really
matters and to be fully engaged in meaningful social
enactments instead of being merely entertained to
avoid boredom. Years from now, when we hear singing at
all, we will hear ourselves, and we will sing with our
whole hearts.


Adapted from The Long Emergency, 2005, by James Howard
Kunstler, and reprinted with permission of the
publisher, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
(Posted Mar 24, 2005)





 

Depleted uranium turns to poison gas*


By Bob Nichols

May 27, 2005--A dedication in 2120 might say: Dedicated to the memory of
the Iraqi people. Many people believe Iraq was the birthplace of
civilization some 5,000 years ago. Iraq was destroyed and radioactively
contaminated in an early 21st Century Oil War by a fascist world power,
now extinguished.

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Media/052705Nichols/052705nichols.html